The Kings Who Cared (ASoIaF AU)

[SRWG]

Spoiler: Summary

A chance meeting in Braavos leads to Young Griff setting his sights on the opposite end of Westeros. When two would-be kings answer the Watch's call, each with his own claim and prophecy, the Seven Kingdoms face a very different future. Eventual Team Aegon/Team Stannis team-up.

Main characters: Aegon VI/Young Griff, Shireen Baratheon, Stannis Baratheon, Jon Snow

If you'd like to know the pairings, shoot me a PM.

The Kings Who Cared

Chapter I: A Duck and a Crow​

Duck had never wanted to be called Duck.

Duck had never wanted many things for that matter, and he felt that he had truly wanted very few things as well. But the fact remained that he had not wanted the moniker which he had accidentally bestowed upon himself. Any knight worth their blade had a second name he'd told himself, and "Duckfield" had sounded as good as anything else might be. If he'd known then that he would grow so used to being called "Duck" that he would think of himself as Duck, then mayhaps he'd have thought a bit more strenuously on his second name.

Sometimes, Duck imagined that it had been wolves in that field rather than ducks. Wolffield didn't roll off the tongue quite so well, but he'd be willing to take that in exchange for being called "Wolf" instead.

Still, Duck fancied himself a skilled hand at smithing, and a more than passing fair swordsman. Clearly, he had not been the only one, otherwise he would never have been knighted in the first place. If he'd never been knighted, well, his life would have been a mite less interesting.

The cost for his interesting prospects, then, was the knowledge that he was the brawn of their endeavor. If something needed to be moved, Duck was the man tasked with it. If someone needed to be moved (six feet under, mostlike), then Duck was the man for that as well. When a missive needed to be passed along to the Spider through one of his little birds (why birds? If the man was a spider, shouldn't it be a fly or somesuch?), then that meant Duck was the man for the task.

After all, everyone else was particularly vital in their own way. Griff was a more than capable swordsman, and could fulfill his role in the meantime. That wounded Duck's pride somewhat, but he hadn't been born with much in the first place. It was only expected for a commonborn man to act as such, at the least.

Braavos, in particular, was a journey he was always willing to make. Some pisspot of a village on the arse-end of the Rhoyne was one thing, but Braavos? Braavos was a destination he looked forward to. No matter how many times Duck sailed under the great Titan and heard its roar, he always found himself giddy. Like he was the near child he'd been when he left Westeros for the "decadent" lands to the east.

Surely, this would be the time that his luck won out. He'd catch the eye of one of the Courtesans and live like a magister for a few days before heading back to his obligations. Without his squire, Duck was released from having to live as a shining knight. Griff didn't want any bad habits bleeding over, after all. Well, there probably wouldn't be any courtesans, but he could still find a nice, affordable woman. And if he didn't do that, then he could surely find other ways to get his blood running.

Namely, wander around after dark with his sword in his hand and wait for a hotblooded young bravo to give him a good time.

Finding the "little bird" had been a simple enough affair. Few paid any attention to a Westerosi traveler grabbing at the skirts of a serving maid. That she had a prominent scar on her face was of little consequence to a man in need of feminine company. So of course, fewer still noticed when he slipped the envelope down her sleeve. She gave him a playful swat, but the knowing smirk she wore told him all he need know. Duck left an extra coin after he downed his wine and returned to the streets.

Duck spent his day wandering the streets, piecing together what he could of the Secret City's own Bastard Valyrian. He could survive in Braavos if he was forced to, but he'd rather not. What little he'd learned in the Golden Company wasn't quite enough for him to live without care. Still, he heard enough to keep himself entertained. The Sealord had had a bout of illness, but was recovering. Khal Drogo was gathering the largest Khalasar the world had ever seen. King Robert was dead, killed by a boar (or a resurrected Rhaegar Targaryen, if some versions of the tale were to be believed).

Duck was still somewhat stunned that King Robert (Duck could never refer to him as simply "The Usurper" like Griff, after all, he was the King Duck had known for most of his life) was truly dead. Sure, the man had lived life few lived for long, but they had not thought themselves lucky enough to count on his early demise. Everything that had happened since was yet more good fortune.

As he walked, Duck noticed something of a trend. At first he heard the occasional mention of the Ragman's Harbor. This didn't seem beyond the ordinary to Duck, as the Ragman's Harbor was the only harbor in Braavos that was open to foreigners. Foreign news or peoples always carried interest to some. Duck still remembered the first time he ever saw an Ibbenese man, so he understood. But as the mentions of the Ragman's Harbor became more common, so too did the whispers of a "hand" and something or someone in black.

Duck hadn't spent several years fighting (and smithing) in the Golden Company because he wanted to live an ordinary life. If he had wanted that, then he never would have left Bitterbridge in the first place. So when the possibility of something of interest arose, he felt a solemn duty to seek it out. In truth, he had a duty to inform Griff of anything amiss, so he felt no qualms about playing at rumormonging.

Arriving in the Ragman's Harbor somewhat later than intended (having stopped for a time to watch the ending of a street mummers' show, as the heroine was particularly buxom), Duck swiftly saw that it was more populated than was its usual. It was easy enough for a man with as sharp an eye and ear as he to figure the origin of the chatter, so Duck made his way to the northern end of the Harbor where he knew the particular tavern sat. Sure enough, while Pynto's smelled of piss, that was not out of the ordinary. The fact that the piss seemed more human than cat was of interest, as was the high amount of foot traffic.

Being a tall man with a sword at his hip was of great benefit when it came to shouldering his way through the crowd of men and women of every stripe, color, and origin. It was slightly less useful when it came to maneuvering through the truly countless cats that called Pynto's their home. After sidestepping a particularly unfriendly Tom, Duck caught sight of a thin man clad all in black at the center of the crowd. The man was aged. He had to have seen more than forty namedays, and probably even fifty if the streaks of grey through his black hair were to believed. He had a severe look to him, and he kept one hand on the hilt of his blade even as he held the top of a wrought iron cage with the other, his dark eyes scanning the crowd.

From his vantage point, Duck couldn't see what exactly the cage contained, so he squeezed past a broad Summer Islander and a green haired man and woman that could only have been Tyroshi. The man in front of him now was at least short enough that Duck could see over his balding head. Finally, he could see the source of all the commotion.

Duck's Braavosi had not failed him, it turned out. For there was indeed a "hand" as he thought he'd heard some mention. It was a particularly rotted hand, and it was black as pitch. He didn't see what was so worthy of gossip in this hand. He'd seen plenty of cut off hands in his life, and he'd never bothered putting them in a cage and showing them off to others.

Then the hand jerked, scraping its way to the other end of the cage. Several women screamed, and time seemed to slow. A thousand thoughts whirled in his head as he looked from the man in black to the hand and then back again, his breathing labored.

Fuck the courtesans, actually. And the bravos too.

Ser Rolly Duckfield had some news to deliver.

 

[SRWG]

Chapter II: King with a Cause​

Everywhere he looked, he saw white. White covered the ground like a dense blanket. Above him, the sky was white as well, and white specks fell from it like a slow rain. He took in a deep breath, the cold air biting at his lungs.

This is snow.

He hadn't seen snow in a very long time. He had been a boy then, frolicking while he wished that his father would come home. The woman he'd thought to be his mother played with him in the snow then, and he'd loved her for it.

But this cold was more than that. It was colder than it had been then. Colder then he could ever remember being in his seventeen years. And yet, despite that cold, he found that he wasn't truly cold. There was a warmth within him, something vital that kept his blood flowing. The air stung, but it wouldn't kill. It couldn't kill him.

He grasped at a falling snowflake. It melted quickly in his palm, and when he looked back up, he saw a new color. Blue. He reached out and touched the blue, and found it to be cold as well, but this didn't melt under his touch as the snowflake did. He looked behind himself, but still saw the field of white, and looking to his right and left he saw that the great blue extended further than he could see. Finally, something fell into place within himself, and he realized it was a wall.

Not just a wall, but the Wall.

It hadn't been there before, had it? Wouldn't he have noticed it? It spoke somewhat poorly of his martial prowess for a structure as large as the Wall to sneak up on him. It must have been there, surely. He looked more closely at it. It was a monstrosity, this wall. Hulking, huge, austere, and even beautiful in a strange sort of way. He knew that the Wall was not solely crafted from ice, that there was some measure of earth and wood throughout the structure, but he couldn't see it as anything but a great beast of ice. It was absolutely unlike anything he'd ever seen.

I wonder how it must look from above?

And then he was in the air, soaring far above the wall like Good Queen Alysanne had once done so long ago. Somehow he'd forgotten that he could fly. He couldn't remember ever doing it himself, but it felt natural enough he supposed. He was a dragon after all.

A dragon at the wall. Fancy that.

Looking down, he saw that the Wall stretched far into the distance both ways, and that the land was truly featureless. Snow was all he could see on both sides of the Wall. No trees, no dwellings, no men. Just snow on the ground and snow in the air. And the Wall, everywhere and nowhere. This high, the wind whipped at his face fiercely, but he could hardly feel it through his scales. His arms (wings?) inexplicably began to tire, and he found himself perching on the Wall to ease his body from the exertion of flight.

It had been his first flight after all, he supposed it was only expected that he'd find himself tired afterwards.

He inspected his right wing. He looked closely at the bones throughout it, so like a hand that it disquieted him some. His scales glinted despite the relatively low light offered by the cloudy skies. He was a dark color, but he couldn't quite tell what. Red, perhaps? Or maybe black? It was so very hard to tell in this damnable light.

And then he was a man again, and he was staring at his very real fingers. His scales were replaced by the tanned skin he was used to (so unlike that of the man he'd always called father). It made some sense. He'd spent his whole life as a man. Could calling a man a dragon make him one?

He shrugged his shoulders and sat on the edge of the wall. It was somewhat odd that there wasn't a parapet. It would be all too simple for one to fall off and meet their end hundreds of feet below. Very impractical wall building. Brandon the Builder should be ashamed. Without warning, ancient Northern kings were the last thing on his mind.

He felt a pull, and he stopped kicking his feet lazily in the air. Something nameless, nebulous, seized at his heart, and his breath shortened. He looked out to the great abyss before the Wall. He didn't know how he knew, but he was looking at the northern side of the Wall. He was staring out at the land that led to the end of the world. The feeling tightened. It was fear that he was feeling, and he didn't even know why. Ragged breaths escaped him, and suddenly he was feeling the cold. His breaths came shorter, and he felt tears sting at his eyes.

There was nothing beyond the Wall. He was staring at nothing. Why was he scared? Why was thinking about it making it so much worse? He wanted to turn back south, where he hadn't felt this pain, this fear. But he couldn't, because something held him tightly in place.

Dragons didn't feel cold, or fear for that matter. But men did. Men felt it all too keenly.

He wished he was a dragon again.

Then there was a great crack, and the Wall was shattering, falling. Snow fell harder, faster. He wanted to scream as he fell, careening through the air, but he couldn't. Maybe he had already been frozen solid and he simply had not yet realized it. For what felt like an eternity, he fell. And then without fanfare, he was on solid ground, standing as if nothing had been amiss to begin with.

The Wall was gone. All he saw now was snow, truly. Snow in the air, snow on the ground. Snow falling so rapidly that he could scarce see in front of himself. The fear still held his heart in a vice. The cold seeped into his every pore, his entire being.

When pinpricks of blue light appeared all around him for as far as he could see, he realized that he needed fire.

A fire so great that no cold could defeat it.

And then he saw eyes, eyes bluer than blue, and high sharp cracks, almost like laughter rang in his ears.

He felt cold.

---

Griff awoke with a start, sweat coating him from head to foot. He clenched a shaking hand to his thin sleeping shirt, each gasping breath gradually less fitful than the last. What in the Seven Hells? Griff couldn't even remember the last time he had dreamed of something so frightening. Why? Had it been his dinner the night before? The cook had prepared a splendid mixture of spicy peppers and fresh-killed hare, but while eating spicy food slightly before he turned in for the night could sometimes cause a fitful rest, this was something else entirely.

He could not blame so vivid and disorienting a dream on spicy food, as tempting as that might be.

Gradually, Griff realized that there was something of a commotion in the next room over. He heard movement and loud, muffled discussion. They were talking over each other, so it was difficult to discern one voice from another. He looked over to the bed that his fa–Jon had been sleeping in the night before and found it empty. It was still dark, and the hearth burned low, providing little light and even less warmth.

He threw the sheet off of him and shot out of bed. The cool air was simply heavenly compared to the heat he had accumulated over his (what had felt like) long night. Listening more closely, he heard what he thought was Jon, as well as a few other male voices, and the higher pitch of who had to be Lemore (for Haldon rarely sought female company, and Jon never had). Griff shook his head, his damp, shoulder-length hair whipping his face. He tucked it behind his ears and then exited the room quietly, trying to put the nightmare away from his thoughts.

The room was directly adjacent to his and Jon's, so it was only a few long strides away, especially due to his height. He already neared Jon's appreciable height, and he still had some ways to go according to the Halfmaester and Lemore. Crouching outside the door, Griff weighed his options. Two years ago, he might have slipped the door slightly open and simply eavesdropped. They hadn't woken him for a reason, clearly. Another part of him begged him to go for a walk to ease his nightmare-addled brain and then return to bed, putting aside this clandestine meeting entirely.

They had hidden so much from him, for so long. It wasn't right, it wasn't–

No. I will not go down that path again.

He shook his head to clear it again. He felt as if a dense fog rested between his temples, and he wanted it gone. Thus far, no success. Griff took a deep breath.

If I am to them what they claim I am, then I should be privy to whatever they have to say.

Griff gave the door a single knock and then swung it open.

Septa Lemore was sitting atop the bed at the far end of the room, still wearing her shift, her dark eyes wide and her face twisted in concern. Jon had been pacing in front of the fire, one big hand behind his back and the other buried in this thick red beard. Haldon sat on a chair to the side of the room, his brow furrowed, hair loose, and hands clutching a thin parchment. And–

"Duck!" Griff exclaimed, quickly closing the door behind him.

Duck had been leaning against the far corner of the room, somewhat obscured due to Jon blocking the hearth and light with his pacing. His red hair was unkempt and his traveling clothes were decidedly worn. Still, his face split with a tired grin when he saw him.

"We hadn't expected you to be back for some time yet," Griff continued. "Was Braavos truly such a bore?"

But that couldn't be the reason. Griff had been to Braavos a number of times, and it was always a feast for the senses. It was something of a disappointment to visit the lesser Free Cities after one has experienced the grandeur of the Secret City.

Duck exchanged a glance with the rest.

"Return to bed." It was Jon who replied instead. "Ser Rolly was only discussing the latest rumors from Braavos."

Griff bristled. Jon was always trying to shield him. Once it hadn't bothered him, but he was a man grown in truth now, and besides…

"I am your king," Aegon said. "I-"

"Rightful king you may be," Jon cut in, straightening his back and squaring his shoulders. "But you are half a boy."

Aegon knew he'd been smaller than his years for most of his life, his constitution never quite as strong as the adults may have liked. Lemore and Jon had been careful with him, but, "I have seen sixteen years," he replied, after a time. "If I sat the throne, you would no longer act as regent, if you had ever in the first place."

Jon's pale blue eyes grew stormy, standing out all the more against the red of his hair and the pale tone of his skin (so obviously different from his own, but children are so very easy to fool).

But it was Duck who spoke next, not Jon. "I think he should know," he said simply.

"If he should rule the Seven Kingdoms, it's only right that he know everything we do," Lemore agreed, the early hour clearly evident in her tone.

Jon and Aegon both turned to Haldon, who only shrugged, passing the parchment he held over to Lemore.

Jon turned toward the hearth, and, with a loud grunt, stoked the fire fiercely. The crackle of wood and flame reverberating through the too-crowded room was all Aegon heard for a time.

"Fine. Tell him, Ser Rolly," Jon finally said, still turned away toward the fire.

Duck nodded. "So I went to Braavos," he said, "just as I was told to. I found the right girl quick enough, and passed that message along. She might have been a pretty thing, if not for that great scar-"

Jon grunted pointedly.

Duck scowled at Jon. "And so, job complete, I fancied myself a walk on the town. Figured I might spend a couple days finding some fun." Duck picked at the inside of his right ear. "But I heard some queer talk, and so I went for its source."

"Is it news of my aunt?" Aegon asked. "Or perhaps ill tidings from Westeros?"

Duck held his ear-picking hand up, halting any further queries. "I found that source at an inn at the Ragman's Harbor, the one with all of the cats. There I met a knight from Westeros. One Ser Alliser Thorne."

Aegon thought to his years of studying Westerosi houses. Thorne, Thorne, Thorne. It came to him suddenly: a smaller house, but still noble. Directly vassal to the crown, and staunch loyalists during the War of the Usurper. Aegon's eyes widened. "Is Westeros truly so shaken after the death of the Usurper?" Jon had hoped it might be the case, but they hadn't truly given it so much thought.

"Yes," Duck said, "but that is something else entirely. This Ser Alliser was a man of the Night's Watch."

This gets stranger and stranger.

"He was sailing to King's Landing to request aid at the Wall, when he was waylaid some by the storm. He had not meant to stop in Braavos."

A chill crawled up Aegon's spine. The Wall.

"But what about a brother of the Night's Watch would warrant such chatter in the streets?" Aegon asked. "Surely, it would not be so fascinating to the smallfolk."

"Aye," Duck confirmed. "It wasn't. It was what he had in his possession that started that fire." Duck looked to Jon, who still stood glowering into the hearth. But when Jon said nothing, he continued. "A severed, rotting hand, with skin as black as jet. He held it in a small cage, and I thought it odd. At least, until the hand came alive."

Aegon laughed. "All this show for such a tale?" He scanned the faces of everyone, and saw little sharing of his humor. Everyone was acting the mummer to perfection! "Jon, what did Duck offer you in exchange to play along with this farce?" He asked, still laughing. A living hand? This was truly one of Duck's best yet.

When Jon didn't respond, Aegon turned back to Duck, whose face was grave.

"The Lord Commander of the Night's Watch was attacked in the night, by two men who had been dead mere hours earlier."

This was a true ghost story now! Certainly one he would tell others when given the chance.

"No matter how they were cut, they continued to attack. Only fire could put them back to the grave where they belonged."

This was a bit excessive, in truth. But it was still wonderful.

"Ser Alliser says their eyes were blue, when they were not before."

In a heartbeat, Griff's merriment vanished. Blue eyes.

… he saw eyes, eyes bluer than blue, and high sharp cracks, almost like laughter rang in his ear…

Griff found his mouth dry suddenly, and he felt cold, despite the fire Jon had kept burning high.

"'Cold winds are rising', he'd said. The Wall might not stand without aid, and so he went south with that dead but living hand as his proof."

Griff looked from one face to the next. Each was grim, quiet, and uncertain.

"This changes nothing," Jon said, finally turning away from the fire, his mouth a thin line. "The Wall has stood for eight thousand years and I am certain it will stand for eight thousand more." His eyes betrayed the force in his words.

Griff licked his lips, searching for the right words. Alone, his nightmare had been upsetting, but not alarming. Now, it was an omen. Darkness beyond the Wall. A great cold. The Wall collapsing. Blue, blue eyes.

Few Kings had ever been heroes in truth. Leaders great and poor, weak and strong, mad and prescient. Many Kings with many manners, and all with dreams of their own. But Griff in that moment knew that his dream had not been like others. This one was true.

Griff breathed in, then out, the fire within him rekindling. He knew what they would say, what Jon would warn against, but it was then that he knew his path forward.

If a King will not fight for his kingdom and its people, by whose right is he King?

"If cold winds are rising at the wall," Aegon said, "then it sounds as though the Night's Watch has need of a dragon."

 

[SRWG]

Chapter III: The Griffinslayer​

"Then they must needs find another," Jon had said.

Aegon had immediately become petulant (to his later shame), and was quickly escorted from Lemore and Haldon's room by the exiled lord of Griffin's Roost and sent back to bed like any common peasant boy.

The next morning he'd been told the other news that Duck had brought from Braavos. Since the death of the Usurper, it seemed Kings were growing ever more common in the Seven Kingdoms. Not simply one, but two others had crowned themselves King in the wake of the Usurper's spawn's ascension. The younger brother of the Usurper in the South, and the former Lord Stark as King to the revived Kingdom of the North. That news in particular had traveled remarkably quickly (from a White Harbor merchant, Duck had claimed). That it was the younger brother of the Usurper who had claimed himself over the Usurper's son and not the elder of the two still remaining brothers was not lost on Jon or Haldon either.

The Baratheon dynasty at its own throat and the Starks entering the fray on their own behalf was more than any of them could have expected to occur, and this was yet more fuel for Jon's fire to sit and wait, to Aegon's fury.

"The Seven Kingdoms tear themselves apart. The time is more ripe than ever for the son of Rhaegar Targaryen to reclaim his stolen throne and bring peace and prosperity to the realm, mending the wounds wrought by the Usurper," Jon had said, "We wait for your aunt and her screamers. An army of Dothraki and the Golden Company would be unmatchable in the field."

"But that hand!" Aegon had shouted back.

"That can wait," Jon had said with finality. "When you are king and your throne is secure, you can chase as many ghost stories as you like. Like as not, Ser Rolly was drunk and took an illusionist's trick for truth." But that rang hollow in Aegon's ears, and he knew that not even Jon believed it.

Aegon had let it die, at least for the moment. Jon was a stubborn mule, and Aegon had known that about the man he had called father for about as long as he had been able to hold a training sword. But Aegon also knew that Jon's first instinct was always to refuse, and that enough pestering would slowly crumble his considerable defenses.

And crumble he would, because Aegon wasn't going to spend a second longer in Essos than he was forced to. His Kingdom needed him, even if the people didn't know it.

When he closed his eyes, he still saw the pinpricks of blue in the blizzard. He still heard that crackling "laughter". He still felt that world-ending cold.

And so time passed.

Aegon continued his tutoring on the Faith with Septa Lemore, though it felt even less important now than ever. It was difficult to focus on the exact nature of the godhead and the ways in which the different aspects of the true God intersected when one felt the pull of destiny ("Leave the heavens to the septons," Duck once said). He kept up his studies with Haldon, for those had always been more interesting to him, and were more directly applicable to kingship. He trained as hard as he ever did with Duck, knowing that his swordsmanship would be important no matter the route the party decided to take in the end.

But he didn't let a day pass when he wouldn't bring the matter to Jon's attention, one way or another.

---

"Lemore, tell me of the Old Gods," Aegon said one morning. He'd heard more than enough concerning the doctrine of exceptionalism. It's not as though there were any unwed Targaryen women for him to betroth himself to, so he was somewhat annoyed at the detail Lemore went into on the topic.

She gave him a stern look, the effect all the more enhanced by her actual wearing of the Septa's habit (as she frequently went without it, particularly when the weather was warm). "You know that the Old Gods are not my concern," she replied.

"The North is one of my Seven Kingdoms as well," he said. Even if they are currently rebelling. "I should know of them and their beliefs as much as any others."

Lemore saw straight through him. His ploy was obvious to her, but he hadn't meant for it to be anything but. She let out a light humph. "The Old Gods are given little consideration in the Faith," she said. "I profess that I know precious little of the Northmen and their trees."

"But surely you must have met a Northerner," he insisted. "And he must have told you something of his faith."

She rested her hands in her lap. "I knew Northerners… Once."

"And?"

Lemore's fingers intertwined in her lap. She stared down at them. Then, finally. "Theirs is a quiet faith. A personal one." She looked up to him, making eye contact. "It has little of the ceremony the Faith does. No Maiden's Day, no sculptures or statues, no septons or septas or Most Devout. The faith of the First Men is a conversation between each individual believer and the Gods they hold sacred." She looked up to him. "When the Andals first came to Westeros, they came with fire and sword, bringing our God with them and the seven-pointed star carved into their foreheads. They razed the villages and holdfasts of the First Men, and cut and burned Weirwood groves to cinders."

"Not very nice of them," Aegon said with a smirk.

She swatted at him. There was no real force, and he dodged it easily. He had made such japes many a time; it was one of many games they played. "Besides the North, which withstood the invasion of the Andals, the remainder of Westeros found itself mixing with the Andal conquerors. Most, adopted the Faith of the Seven. What remained of the First Men's faith was a fractured, weakened thing. Most of the rites and ceremonies they may have once had lost were lost to war and time. Weirwood trees remain at many House seats in Westeros in their Godswoods, as a token of the Andals' good will to those who remained fervent in their faith."

"And what of the Old Gods themselves?"

Lemore looked beyond him then, seeing so far away as to see nothing at all. "They are nameless, but numerous. Most in the North believe that they fled the South entirely with the destruction of the Weirwood groves. They inhabit everything there is to see or feel. Every stream that flows between your fingers, every stone that turns beneath your feet, every desperately grasping tree, every hill and every mountain. Believers claim they hear them in the music of a river, or the in the wind through the leaves of trees."

Aegon was quiet for a time as he turned it around in his head. He'd heard parts of it all before at one time or another, but in light of his plans it rang somewhat different. It was… almost sad, in a way. A faith that had spread across all Westeros, from the Wall to Dorne, all but snuffed out. Reduced to something frail and forgotten. "Does it not feel… wrong, maybe? To espouse a religion that destroyed another so?"

"No," she replied, "I don't feel it does." When he made to reply, she waved him off. "There is no shame in being the conqueror, and you of all people, Aegon, should understand that. The First Men conquered the Children before them, or so they say, and the Andals the First Men, and Aegon the Dragon and his sisters the both of them. Only, Aegon accepted the Seven as the First Men once accepted the Old Gods from the Children. On the Black Dread's back, Aegon might have burnt the Starry Sept to the ground and forced the Valyrian gods upon us all. Instead, he took our God as his own."

She fingered the seven-pointed star pendant she wore about her neck. "Here in Essos, it may be difficult to feel the touch of the Seven, but I feel it all the same. Whether you truly accept God into your heart, only you will ever be able to decide, but if you intend to be King then you must at least accept them for the realm to see."

"As Aegon the Conqueror once did," Aegon finished.

---

"Haldon, tell me of the Wall," Aegon said one afternoon. Wherever they traveled, the Halfmaester carried several chests full of books. They were easily among the heaviest of the cargo their party carried. The books meant that wherever they went, Haldon could fashion something of a study for himself. Septa Lemore and Haldon shared rooms during most of their extended stays at inns and taverns. It was convenient, for she had little in the way of personal affects. This was all the better, as it was more room for Halfmaester's impromptu study.

"You know of the Wall," Haldon said, "We aren't fools, Aegon. We know very well what you are doing; Septa Lemore tells Jon of your little discussions."

Aegon sat back in the chair that was allotted him and crossed his arms. "Good!" he said, not being able to help the petulance that poisoned his words. "I want him to know what his King seeks!"

Haldon shook his head. "Any man who must say 'I am the King'…"

Is no true king at all. Aegon slumped in his chair. If they didn't want him to make demands, they never should have told him who he was. Griff son of Griff was content to live the life they asked of him, but Aegon couldn't sit back and wait. Wouldn't.

Haldon sifted through the stack of parchments he had withdrawn from his chest before this lesson had started. At last, he found the one he sought and held it out to Aegon imploringly. "Duck brought that from Braavos," he said.

Aegon took it. It was unmistakably written in Duck's shoddy hand. When Duck had learned that the boy Griff he instructed in the art of battle was in truth Aegon (indeed, this was at the same time Aegon himself had learned that little fact), he had taken it upon himself to learn his letters. He'd insisted that "if a duck is to serve a dragon, then it damn well better learn to read and write." Aegon's insistence that neither ducks nor dragons could do either of those things fell on deaf ears of course. It had been painstaking, but Haldon had proven his mastery by teaching an old duck new tricks.

The parchment bore notes that Duck had taken during his stay in Braavos.

"Whether he was intoxicated, as Jon claims, or not, what he saw in that tavern rattled him," Haldon said.

The scrawlings on the paper were frantic, it seemed. It contained more or less everything Duck had relayed to Aegon that fateful night. Duck must have written it all down to ensure that he forgot nothing. At the bottom was a simple statement, with several lines scratched underneath it for emphasis.

THE NIGHT'S WATCH REQUIRES AID

Aegon bristled. He couldn't stand this.

"It is said that giants aided Brandon the Builder's construction of the Wall," Haldon finally said. "And that he used long forgotten magics to bind the ice to earth and wood. Much and more is said of the feats of Brandon the Builder, but little is known for truth. Long ago, the Wall was manned by perhaps tens of thousands of men. Needless to say, it has dwindled. Only a handful of keeps remain, mayhap less. Few, if any, deem it worthy to subject themselves to the cold and deprivation one finds at the Wall."

Unless their only other options are death, mutilation, or castration.

"Any claims of Others, wights, grumkins, or snarks, have been long disputed by the Citadel. Generally it is agreed that any such creatures are long gone from the world. Many will go so far as to say they never existed at all, and are mere legends. The Wall is more than enough to fend off Wildlings, in any case."

"But… you left the Citadel because you disagreed with their methods," Aegon said, his grip tightening around the edge of the parchment. "So why put any stock in their conclusions then, Halfmaester?"

Haldon considered it. That was one thing Aegon would always love Haldon for; no matter how inane his questions or ponderances might be, the Halfmaester was always willing to give it some thought, and not simply dismiss the thoughts out of hand.

"I studied the higher mysteries at the Citadel, trying my hand at magecraft myself. No matter how I repeated the so-called 'spells' or incantations, no matter the omens or constellations I waited on, I could produce nothing one might call magic. Magic is gone from the world, Aegon," Haldon answered. "Our party has traveled all over Essos. Have you seen anything that cast doubt on that statement?"

Aegon had seen much and more in one Free City or another. He had witnessed the bearded priests in Norvos and heard its great bells, so like the voices gods. He had seen the Red Priests at their nightfires in Pentos, and even heard their grand proclamations of visions in the flames. He had even once seen a blue lipped warlock of Qarth with his entourage in Braavos. Yet not one of those times, could Aegon say he had truly witnessed what he might call magic. But… there was one thing.

"And what of Daenys the Dreamer?" Aegon asked.

"Hmm?" Haldon quirked an eyebrow, clearly confused by his change in conversation.

"She was not the only Targaryen to dream of prophecy, correct? There were others, even after the last dragons died."

"Indeed, there were others. Can you name them?"

Aegon found his tongue quickly, he'd given the question much thought as he lay in bed each night since Duck returned. "King Aegon V, I think. And my father." It was strange to think of Rhaegar as his father, even now, over a year since he learned the truth.

Haldon nodded. "Daemon II Blackfyre, as well," he said, "Though he was no Targaryen by name, his blood was as much of the Dragon as yours. Tell me, Aegon, what do these three dreamers share?"

Aegon thought. The fifth King Aegon died in flames at the tragedy at Summerhall, where his father was born. He had sought to hatch dragons, Haldon said. Rhaegar was dead at the Trident, killed by the Usurper Robert Baratheon, after some mad notion to seize the Stark girl. The second Daemon Blackfyre was more difficult. He was something of a minor detail in the Halfmaester's teachings. He… he had attempted a rebellion. Yes, that was it. The second Blackfyre rebellion. His dreams had spoken of dragons and kingship, and instead, his rebellion had been snuffed out before it ever began, and he died in the Black Cells of Kings Landing.

"Ruin," Aegon said, fighting the tremor in his throat. They had all perished following the path their dreams had set.

Haldon took the parchment from Aegon's hand.

"Aye, ruin."

---

The next morning, Aegon sought out Duck rather than Septa Lemore. Jon had sparred with Aegon some while Duck was away, but he didn't get into it quite like Duck did. While the ocean air of the Bay of Lorath dulled the heat somewhat, the Essosi sun was ever scorching later in the day. So it was always best to spar early if they could help it.

It was Lemore who helped him pull on his armor though. He could handle his thick padding well enough on his own, but the armor gave him trouble at times. Her hand was particularly deft at the ties of his armor. With a quick profusion of thanks, Aegon whisked himself outside the inn.

The town they had occupied these past moons was a small sort of center, but it was well guarded enough (and close enough to the sea) that Dothraki had not nipped at its heels for some decades. While close to Lorath, it was in actuality subservient to the interests of Braavos, and while Braavos prided itself on its supremacy over most of the Free Cities, it was not above trade with them when tensions cooled. This town acted as a last stop between Braavos and Lorath for those times. Being a small port, Aegon had utilized every chance to discuss the goings on with every new batch of sailors. It was a nice opportunity to practice his trade talk as well as the different sorts of Bastard Valyrian.

Aegon found the lightly grassed clearing that sat squat between the inn and a few trees. Haldon was already sitting beneath one of the trees with a thick tome in his hands. Duck leaned against another tree, armored and ready to fight with both of their weapons in hand.

"You ready Young Griff?" Duck called out as he neared. They fell back to his old name whenever they might be heard by others. At his nod in response, Duck walked into the sunlight and tossed Aegon his tourney sword in a clean, practiced motion.

Catching it out of the air, Aegon relaxed some. His night had been less than pleasant, as he wrestled with thoughts of his dream, and ultimately had a troubled sleep. Those nightmares were normal, but no less troubling to his demeanor. The familiar weight of a tourney sword in his hand allowed him to forget his worries, at least in part. The sword was a bastard sword.

Despite his insistences as a child, his fa–Jon had rarely allowed him to practice at sword and shield. It had never made sense to Aegon, why he should use only a sword when he might use a shield as well. A shield was just as much a potential weapon as any blade. Still, he had practiced at the hand and a half sword for as long as he could hold a wooden imitation, and the day he had progressed to tourney swords had been one of his proudest.

Duck smirked at him and lowered his visor, readying his sword. He favored stances with middle guards, and had imparted that same favor upon Aegon through years of practice.

Aegon mirrored him, his visor already lowered.

It was Duck who struck first, with a sudden thrust (the "Duck's peck" Aegon had once japed) that nearly caught him off guard. He'd expected Duck to be somewhat out of practice after so much time spent at sea. Aegon batted it to the side with a quick parry but Duck was on him again in an instant with a counterstroke to his side. Aegon blocked that as well and went for a hard slash at Duck's feet to trip him.

Duck retreated swiftly however and remained standing.

"What do you think, Duck?" Aegon asked.

"About that slash?"

"No, about–"

Duck advanced quickly, barreling into Aegon with a hard shoulder, knocking him to the ground. "It could be better." Aegon could hear the smirk in his voice.

Growling, Aegon kicked out at Duck and slashed wildly to force him to back up. Returning to his feet as quick as he could manage, Aegon attempted to let the taunt leave him. Duck knew just how to infuriate him. He knew he was predictable when he was angry.

"About the Wall," Aegon finally bit out. "About Ser Alliser Thorne." They had talked some in the time since his return, but Duck had avoided any mention of what he had been witness to in Braavos. "About the hand."

Duck rushed forward again, feinting to his left but striking hard at his right. Aegon fended it off and swung at his midsection. He was rewarded with a grunt and Duck retreating once more.

"I think it terrified me out of my wits," Duck replied, serious for once in his life. "It was no trick, and as much I might have liked otherwise, I'd but a sip of wine."

"It was a rotted hand, truly?"

"Truly."

Aegon advanced this time, aiming at his head to ring him like one of Norvos' bells. Duck parried, but Aegon kept it up, swinging first at his chest, then his upper leg, then back to his head. Finally, he got him on the hand and Duck dropped his sword, gasping.

Duck made a grab for Aegon's blade, but Aegon slashed at him. Duck, proving his fitness, dodged out of the bastard sword's reach.

Aegon knelt for Duck's sword and tossed it to him as he had done at the beginning of their bout; Duck caught it just as easily.

"Whatever is happening beyond the Wall…" Duck said, trailing off. "…I like it not"

Aegon looked over to Haldon. He was still reading studiously, but Aegon knew he always kept one ear open, even when he seemed busy. "I had a dream," Aegon said, lowering his voice.

Duck didn't respond immediately, instead charging him and sending several sweeping strikes his way. "Aye, I had a dream too." Exertion was evident in his voice, even as Aegon parried and returned slashes. "About the Black Pearl." He laughed.

Aegon attacked low, but half-heartedly. Duck parried and they clashed several times, producing a terrible clamor. "No, Duck," Aegon said, batting aside Duck's blade, "I dreamt of the Wall before you returned." Duck thrusted and Aegon side stepped, aiming a one-handed strike for his back. "About a terrible cold and blue eyes." Duck took the hit, stopping suddenly.

"I dreamt that the Wall fell, Duck. Right to bits."

Duck didn't respond.

Aegon could only see shadows of flesh and eyes behind Duck's visor. He couldn't assess his reaction well with so little visible. He pushed on, heedless. "You agree with me, don't you Duck."

"About going to the Wall?" Duck finally replied.

Aegon nodded.

Duck readied his blade again. "I do," he said, shaking his head, "Seven Gods save me."

---

It was when the sun sat high in the sky and Aegon was coated in sweat beyond what he thought possible that Jon finally showed himself. He had been spending an unusual amount of time at the town's small harbor, and considering his own habit, this was notable.

Aegon raised his visor and squatted down to help Duck return to his feet, the both of them panting profusely. He turned toward the tree whose shade Haldon had been taking advantage of and saw the newcomer plainly. Jon stood looming beside the still reading Halfmaester, arms crossed and visage as grim as ever it was.

Duck raised his visor, his green eyes creased in a grin. "You go get 'im, eh?" He said, holding his hand out.

Aegon passed over his tourney sword. "Soon I think I shall be winning more than I'm losing, Duck," Aegon said, smirking.

"Bah, there's still a white yet. I've been counting."

Laughing, Aegon tore off his helmet and shook his hair out. It felt good to feel the ocean breeze after hours in an iron shell. He tossed it to Duck as well. He made his way over to Jon, and found his contented grin fading from his lips. By the time he stood in front of the exiled lord, he matched him in expression.

Jon's red roots were showing. He would need to dye his hair again soon if hoped to keep any semblance of a disguise. Aegon's fair hair had always taken to the blue dye somewhat easier, and when his roots showed, it was less stark.

"Walk with me, son," Jon said.

Aegon did.

Because despite everything he had learned, everything that had changed, it was still what felt most natural to him.

They walked for a time in silence, Aegon following the man he'd once called "father's" lead. They walked the roads of the oceanside town, passing women carrying baskets with children at their heels, men carrying early morning catches, and enterprising smallfolk of all ages hawking goods of one sort or another. Aegon might have bought a clam or cockle had he not just fought. Eating so soon after swordplay tended to make him ill.

Before, they were never "smallfolk" to him. For most of his life they had merely been "folk". To part of him still, they were simply "folk". But that's not how a king ought to think, or so Jon said.

The small harbor was always where it was most busy. Men and women bustled from one end to the other, raucous sailors hauled this cargo or that cargo from ship to pier and back. A great beast of a whaling ship sat on the far end of the harbor, the hairy men of Ibb apparent even from this distance.

"Where are we going?" Aegon asked. He felt somewhat awkward, still wearing most of his armor and padding. They might have stopped at the inn and allowed him to change into fresh clothing.

Jon indicated to the closest pier. No ship was harbored there, so it was miraculously empty.

When they stood on the pier, and Jon still didn't say anything, Aegon knelt and removed his greaves, then his boots. Task complete, he sat on the edge and dipped his feet into the cool water. For all that the lands and islands about the Lorath Bay were considered poor among the Free Cities, it was still beautiful. He stared out toward the horizon, taking in the great blue expanse of the Lorathi Sea. For a moment, he couldn't even hear the shouts of the sailors, the creaking of hulls, or the squawking of seabirds. All he could see was the blue. It made him remember the first time he'd dyed his hair with Jon.

"All that I do, I do for you," Jon said suddenly.

Aegon stopped swaying his legs in the water. The cacophony of the harbor returned. He turned and looked up to Jon, who stared out to the ocean as he had moments before. This was not something he expected from Jon, not in the least.

"I know," Aegon said.

Jon was silent again, for a time. "Your father–he chased legends. He chased dreams. He was regal and gallant and everything that a king should be." He stopped, then started, "He might have brought the Seven Kingdoms into a golden age… Jaeharys the Conciliator come again. Instead, he chased legends and he died."

"…I know."

Jon turned to Aegon then. "In the end, it did not matter how rightful his claim was, how principled he was, or how much knowledge he accrued. It did not matter that he thought that prophecy called him to act, how he did what he must, how kingly he might have been. None of that mattered," he said. "What mattered is that he died in the waters of the Trident."

Aegon said nothing. He knew all of this, but…

"I won't let it happen again," Jon said as he turned back toward the ocean, the breeze catching his still mostly blue hair.

Aegon didn't know how to respond to that. Vulnerability was not something he had ever expected from his father, and definitely not Jon Connington.

"I am not my sire," Aegon said, "No matter my blood, there is more of you in me than there is Rhaegar Targaryen." Jon's head whipped to him, but Aegon continued, "You didn't raise a fool. Nor did Lemore, nor Haldon, nor even Duck."

Jon didn't cut him off.

"I dreamt of the Wall, Jon." He said, suddenly feeling the chill once again. "I dreamt of a cold so severe, so freezing, that it would surely end all. I dreamt of the Wall crumbling to dust. I saw the eyes of which Ser Alliser Thorne spoke. I dreamt it all the night Duck returned."

Aegon saw the fear and uncertainty behind Jon's eyes, he understood it even, on some level. But he knew what he had to do.

"I know how it must sound, Jon, I do, but I will not make the mistakes of the man who sired me." He lowered his voice. "A king cannot follow forever."

"They cannot," Jon agreed.

"Winter is coming Jon, and I fear that if I do not go, it may be the last." Aegon felt a firm hand on his shoulder and looked up.

Jon looked tired, tired far beyond his years. But when he looked down at Aegon, he saw that there was some fire yet in him.

"We'll go to Braavos then," Jon Connington said. "And after a time, from there to Eastwatch." The hand on Aegon's shoulder clenched.

Aegon stood then, his eyes almost level with Jon's own.

"Thank you," he said. Slipping his boots back on and picking up his greaves, Aegon headed back toward the town, Jon following close behind.

A ship was coming in.

Spoiler: AN

Posting the story here for good measure, I'll probably do a couple chapters a day till I'm caught up to the other sites. Hope you all enjoy it well enough!

 

[SRWG]

Chapter IV: Comets, Claims, Cockles, and Clams​

It had taken longer than expected for Jon to charter passage to Braavos for the five of them and their cargo. It was a port town, so this was somewhat surprising. After all, easy transport was the reason they had stopped there in the first place; it gave Duck a direct journey to Braavos and back for his missive carrying. Duck had been only one man though, and trade was booming in the Free Cities, so it made some sense that few would want to take on five travelers and their goods as well when so much gold was being made transporting goods alone.

They tended not to stay in one place for long, and the original plan had been to perhaps visit Lorath itself for a time. Lorath, being one of the poorer Free Cities, might not have been the most exciting adventure, but it would have been an adventure nonetheless. Yandry and Ysilla with their Shy Maid were still on the far end of the Rhoyne most like, and they had not been due to meet them on the close end for some time.

He had looked forward to seeing the two of them again, and sailing down the Rhoyne as well. It had been a few years, and he loved them dearly. He hoped they would forgive him when they saw him next.

Aegon had spent the meantime continuing his drills with Duck and his tutoring with Lemore and Haldon. He delved deeper into the circumstances surrounding the Second Blackfyre Rebellion, and even moved backwards to more closely examine the first as well. He talked of Gods of all sorts with Lemore: Old, New, Red, and others. With Duck, he had even finally been allowed to practice with live steel. They knew not what dangers lurked at the Wall, so it was of import that Aegon knew the balance and feel of a genuine blade (Blackfyre Rebellions fresh in his mind, he bestowed his simple hand-and-a-halfer with the name Brightfyre).

He continued to dream of the Wall. Little changed in his dreams. Sometimes, he felt he could remain flying for a fraction longer before becoming a man once again and tumbling down as the Wall crumbled. Sometimes, he swore he could make out figures in the blizzard, but most times he could only keep sight of the blue eyes. Always, he woke with the chill of death lodged deeply in his spine, and fear clutching his heart like a dead man's grip.

It was during Jon's search for a willing captain that the comet appeared, streaking across the sky in a crimson swipe like a painter's mistake on a blue canvas. Aegon had been training with Duck when he noticed it, and had earned himself a swat on the back of his helmet when he stopped to gape at it.

After Duck's laughter and jeering, he too had turned to gape at it.

Lemore thought it an auspicious portent. It was Targaryen scarlet, she claimed, and a sure sign that Aegon was on the right path. Haldon was less sure, taking the time to explain the Citadel's views on such celestial bodies as comets.

Perhaps Lemore was correct though, because it was shortly after the comet began its heavenly journey that Jon finally stumbled on a captain and ship willing to take their party on. What he found was an ungainly galley called the Drunken Widow. Aegon quickly took a liking to the look of it. He found that he had a certain affection for ugly ships (mayhaps he had experienced the Shy Maid too early in his life), finding that they seemed to have more character to him.

Duck, of course, disagreed. "Character? Bah! Were that ship a woman I would take care to leave the candles unlit if you take my meaning," he'd said.

Aegon had been the first onto the ship to help Duck carry their heavy chests laden with Haldon's books into the cargo hold. The air had felt fresher on the deck, somehow, even though it was scarce different from breathing that same air on the docks. Aegon liked ships. He liked sailing. He was more at home at sea or river than he had ever been on any sort of steed, so perhaps it was comfort that enhanced his senses.

The voyage had passed well enough. The crew proved rowdy and quarrelsome whenever the opportunity for a quarrel presented itself, but he found that he liked the arguments and the dicing and betting and everything else. Jon never did; he seemed vaguely worried that the oarsmen might take up arms against the captain (a thick bellied man from Myr with a thunder in his throat), though in truth he misliked near every crew they had ever sailed with. Aegon saw it for what it was though; a quiet ship was a boring one, and the men knew that, surely.

Jon's general distrust of common men aside, the ship made its way across the waters of the Bay of Lorath quickly enough, the comet making its way across the sky all the while. Aegon performed odd tasks for the Drunken Widow's crew as they went. Bandying out provisions, trimming sails, even taking to the oars for a time. Jon thought the work ill fit for a king, he knew, but Aegon cared little for his opinion in such matters.

One night, as they supped, an oarsman by the name of Lazeo asked him a simple question.

"You don't look like no Tyroshi man I ever seen," he said as he tore through some salted fish. "So why blue?" He indicated to Aegon's hair.

The old lies had spilled from his lips easily. They had not been lies to him for much of his life, and some days he forgot they were lies at all. "My mother was Tyroshi," he replied. "But she died when I was very young. My father and I dye our hair blue in her memory."

"Ah," Lazeo said, his mouth full of fishmeat and hard biscuit, "I knew a Tyroshi girl. Fine woman she was." He'd raised his allotment of wine then, and said, "To your mother!"

Aegon raised his as well, smiling in thanks of the gesture.

After, he had thought of Elia Martell, his mother in truth. While very different from the woman Jon had told stories of in his youth, she was just as dead. Jon had always said that his mother ("Seresa", he had named her) had been killed by a thief, looking for his father's gold while Jon and he had been at market (he would only have been two or so). Aegon had taken to the story easily; his earliest years were a blur to him, and all through childhood Jon had possessed a seemingly limitless purse of gold. He had been distraught to hear the tale of his mother's death when Jon finally had deemed him old enough.

So naturally, the truth was far worse.

Elia Martell, a frail woman held as all but hostage to a mad king, married to a man who ran off with a girl-woman and plunged the kingdom into war. She'd given his father two fine children, despite her known infirmity, and in return she received death. Raped and killed at the orders of Tywin Lannister, while his young sister was stabbed a hundred times, and his poor replacement's head dashed into nothing. Only her fear of his grandfather and his own young age had pushed her to agree to the plot that saw him spirited across the Narrow Sea.

All he had of her was his complexion. Not so dark as Rhaenys or his mother, but not quite so light as his father.

So often now, he thought of himself as a Targaryen. A dynasty all but extinct, especially now after the death of his uncle Viserys. The Targaryen name itself would die if he did not one day marry and have children. But he was as much Martell as he was Targaryen, and through Elia he still had much in the way of living family. Prince Doran and his three children, as well as the storied Red Viper and his brood of bastards. He longed to meet them all one day, but he could easily see the distaste for his mother and her family whenever Jon spoke of them.

He wanted to ask what they had ever done to him to garner such emotions, but as yet he had not been able to find the words.

With the speed of the ship, it was not long before Aegon found himself in Braavos ("Right under the gate of the Titan's Bollocks," Duck said). The Titan never failed to astonish Aegon, though now it seemed somewhat lesser in comparison to the Wall of his dreams. Still, it was one of Lomas Longstrider's Nine Wonders Made by Man, and so it was impressive nonetheless, even if the Wall dwarfed it by near three hundred feet.

The roar and bustle of the Ragman's Harbor was always a wonder to him as well. Few places he had ever been could claim to be as lively as it was on near any day. As he and Duck carried Haldon's chests the distressingly long way to Jon's chosen inn, they had passed Aegon's favorite resident of Braavos. The kingly seal clapped and barked and made a racket while a cutpurse plied his trade on the onlookers. He had waved to Casso as he walked, and was delighted to see the recognition in the trained seal's demeanor.

No sooner than they had become situated in their lodgings at the Sailmender's did Jon spring into action. Immediately, he had Duck snatch up a considerable amount of parchment and ink at market, and then he got about his business.

---

"What are you doing?" Aegon asked, sitting on his bed in the room he and Jon shared at the Sailmender's.

Jon's quill scratched furiously at the parchment. Rarely did Aegon see such a look of concentration on his foster father's face. "Attempting to salvage the mess you have so heroically drawn us into before it occurs."

Aegon scowled. "You agreed with me, damn you!" he said, throwing his arms out.

"Yes, I did. That is why I am the one salvaging it," Jon replied, growling slightly.

Aegon peered over at the letter. "Is it to Illyrio, then?"

Illyrio was… interesting. Aegon had dull memories of the man from his earliest childhood, from before Jon had become Griff and taken him as his son. Lemore had raised him in Illyrio's manse, while the magister himself had been something of a kindly uncle to him. Candied ginger had been a favorite snack of his ever since. He had met Illyrio again the times they had visited Pentos, but rarely spent much time in the company of the fat man. He was kind enough to Aegon, and had evidently been a great swordsman in his youth (which was always something Aegon appreciated in a person), but he was also seemingly constantly busy. Busy or gorging himself.

He was a grotesque sight to look upon, truly, but Aegon knew that when he finally sat the Iron Throne, it would be in large part due to the will of Magister Illyrio Mopatis of Pentos. What Illyrio expected in return, he could not say, but it did not seem possible that he would play kingmaker for no reward. The investment was too great for such a tradesman to not receive something from it.

"Yes," Jon said after a particularly violent quill scratching, "and to others as well. Lord Varys, Harry Strickland…"

Varys… The Golden Company…Illyrio and his wealth… Aegon frowned to himself.

When he was much younger, when Haldon had first begun to tutor him on history, houses, poetry, and so on, Aegon had been a terror. He knew this. He had been Seven Hells to keep from jumping out of his seat and grasping for something to play with. It had taken considerable time and effort (and a number of strikes) to tame his energy and mold him into a proper student. "You never cease wriggling," Jon had complained, so long ago "You are a damned stoat." While he had learned to mitigate his wild impulses, he was still a vigorous youth, and he had grown into a vigorous man. He threw himself into every task, kept moving, not resting if he could help it. Deep down, he knew he would never be able to sit still for long.

After Jon, Haldon, and Lemore finally told him that he was not the Young Griff, that he was in truth Aegon Targaryen heir to the Iron Throne, and of the plans already in place to seize it for him, his tendency to keep himself moving only grew.

Little of the plans made any sort of sense to him. Why the Golden Company would fight and die for a Targaryen was beyond him, and what Illyrio stood to gain even further. The Spider only made the web more complex and for the life of him he could not link it all together into something coherent. He could not think about it. Instead, he accepted it for what it was, and carried it forward.

If I look back, I am lost.

Whatever the reasons, whatever the motives, they intended to help him win his throne, and he would not send back so gracious a gift.

"And Aemon Targaryen…" Jon continued, jogging Aegon from his thoughts.

Aegon almost gaped. "The maester at the Wall? He still lives?" he asked.

"We shall see, shall we not?" Jon responded, still writing.

Aegon had never considered that the man might still be drawing breath. He must be north of one hundred years!

"Your father wrote letters to him frequently enough."

He knew the stories of King Daeron the Good's children well. Aemon had been a maester first, then a man of the Night's Watch, for fear that some would use him as a political tool against his younger brother, Aegon V's rule. Aegon had always hoped to meet Viserys (before his death), and still wanted to meet Daenerys, but she was even younger and further removed from the Targaryen history than he was. To meet Aemon Targaryen, who had seen so much in his long life, would be beyond his wildest anticipations.

"But would it not be a risk to tell him of my identity?" Aegon asked.

Jon stopped writing. "Yes, it would be." His quill resumed scratching. "I would not have us greet the Watch as interlopers. Their resources, their manpower, their very keeps have deteriorated. If we might come bearing gifts of food, weapons, and materials, then it is less likely they might doubt our intentions,"

"And the Golden Company."

Jon nodded solemnly. "With ten thousand swords at our back, whatever threat lurks beyond the Wall will be of little concern, be it a new wildling king… or dead men walking. But if we are to do this, armies must be moved, ships must be gathered, goods bought and transported… In short, messages must fly. I would have booked passage to Pentos to discuss matters with Illyrio personally if I did not think you would escape to Westeros without me to watch you."

Aegon laughed. That would be a very real possibility, especially if Illyrio did not prove amenable. He dared not deny it.

Grumbling, Jon shook his head. "Seven curse these Free Cities and their dearth of ravens."

---

Moons passed, with Aegon growing ever more infuriated with each successive turn, the red comet blazing and blazing across the sky all the while.

Aegon used his time as he always had. Lessons with Haldon, discussions (as well as harp and other sorts of lessons) with Lemore, sparring with Duck, and exploring every inch of the city he could. Haggling with fishwives, snacks of shellfish beyond counting, catching sight of courtesans once or twice a fortnight, roaming the Isle of the Gods. "A learned man is a wise one," Haldon liked to say, and so he sought new experiences everywhere he went.

Braavos was a large city, with a vibrant population and new travelers and traders continuously replacing the old, but even still, he grew bored of it.

News continued to filter in from Westeros, and Varys and his birds besides.

His aunt had disappeared. Her husband, the great Khal Drogo was dead and his khalasar fractured. Like as not, she had been taken to Vaes Dothrak, and her child killed or taken in the aftermath of Khal Drogo's death.

It had been an emotional blow he had not expected. It was one more Targaryen gone, another family member he'd never get to meet. His little cousin as well…

Word from Westeros was that the traitor kings claimed Joffrey Baratheon to be a bastard by incest. The lion queen had bedded her own brother the Kingslayer to beget the Usurper's supposed children… or so the stories went.

Stannis Baratheon had not let his younger brother claim the throne unopposed after all, and had quickly declared himself true king to the Iron Throne.

And then Balon was King of the Iron Islands once again.

The Watch had gone beyond the Wall in force.

All while Aegon sat on his hands, waiting for his army and his ships.

Jon seemed to be writing at all times, and every time a ship brought word from Illyrio, it was never what Aegon wanted to hear.

Then Renly Baratheon, the King in the Reach was dead. Supposedly, at the hand of one of his own Kingsguard, or the Queen Mother of the North, depending on the teller of tales. Stannis Baratheon had bewitched his fallen brother's army with the help of a Red Priestess (this was particularly hilarious to Aegon; he'd known many a Red Priest and Priestess and found them pleasant folk) and set sail for Kings Landing. The King in the North traded blows with Tywin Lannister in the Riverlands and Westerlands.

Then Winterfell was razed! And Stannis was dead! Perishing in flames on the Blackwater. Or fleeing with his tail between his legs, or killed in single combat by Joffrey Baratheon himself.

It was only the ever-continuing recurrence of his dreams of the Wall that kept him from changing course and staking his claim while Westeros was in flames. Each time fresh tidings from Westeros reached Braavos, he felt his commitment to his journey north waver, but then he remembered that chill. He remembered Duck's rare solemnity when recounting what he saw at Pynto's, and he maintained course.

But thus far, that course had led him nowhere.

---

All told, it was eight moons before Aegon was called into the room he and Jon shared for a discussion of "great import". Lemore and Haldon were there already, and Duck filtered in shortly afterward. Jon sat at the writing desk he had specifically ordered brought into the room, a stack of letters in hand and sporting a particularly stoic expression.

When they had all settled into the chairs or against the beds, Jon began.

"The Golden Company will not come," he said, voice even more grim than his words.

Aegon shot to his feet. "But Illyrio! T-The contract!" His hands shook and his thoughts whirled in his head, a jumble and a hurricane.

Jon held up the stack of letters and slammed it onto the desk. "I have sent letter after letter. I cajoled, I bribed, I reasoned, and nothing will sway that craven Strickland."

"Illyrio said he would pay an extra half!" Aegon said.

"The offer was made, and still, that did not sway them. Not when they have that Spider spinning his web in their ear," Jon spat.

Lemore appeared disquieted, her hands gripping her dress tightly. "Does he truly work against us, after everything?"

Crossing his arms, Jon answered, "Harry has not said as much directly, but I know the Spider's work when I see it. The few letters Lord Varys has returned me have cautioned us against going north. 'Leave the North to the North,' he says. 'Why expend the Golden Company's strength chasing ghosts when it would be better spent against the Lannisters,' and so on."

"He knows the circumstances in the Seven Kingdoms better than most," Haldon said, "if he were communicating with Strickland, it would not be surprising that he would heed his advice."

"Homeless Harry worries that there is little to plunder so far north."

Aegon grit his teeth. Plunder and rape was not why he wanted the Golden Company. I won't be the cause of more Elias, Rhaenys, and Pisswater Princes. The Sack of Kings Landing had been brutal, and if he could help it, he would not let anything like it occur under his black and red banners.

"Without Drogo's screamers, their chances are grim, he claims. And his godsdamned elephants. He worries that they would not survive so far north." Jon threw a letter in frustration. "…Blackheart would not have let such petty concerns sway him," Jon continued. "The Golden Company has grown soft under Strickland, they clamor for gold and women like common sellswords. They want only an easy fight. They forget Bittersteel, they forget their roots."

Duck visibly bristled at that comment. It had been long years since Jon had left the Golden Company, Miles "Blackheart" Toyne had still commanded as Lord-Captain in those days, but Duck had left the Golden Company only four years past, and had been sent by Strickland himself. "Can you blame them?" he said, his voice raised. "Why freeze to fight an enemy that may not be there at all, when they could wait for fighting to break out in the Disputed Lands? Where there is plunder, women, and fighting aplenty?"

Jon's eyes clouded and his brow set. He seemed about ready to strike Duck when Haldon cut in. "What motives have you given the Company?" he asked Jon.

"I have told them of the deserted keeps of the Night's Watch. The forces of the North are away in the South. If we were to claim those keeps now, we would have a staging ground to take the North out from behind their so-called King's back. From there, concerns at the Wall would be easily taken care of."

"But you haven't told them of what Duck saw," Aegon said, voice low, "or my dreams?" Jon had discussed the matter with him. It was profoundly unlikely that the Golden Company would cross the Narrow Sea to fight… what? An army of dead men? A great world ending cold? Aegon knew not what they would find there, he knew only that it needed fighting against. All they had was the word of a lowborn sellsword, though a knight Duck may be. The so-called strategy of starting the conquest in the North rather than the south was a truly necessary deception.

That they wouldn't even fight to claim the North spoke volumes on how they might have taken Aegon's genuine intent.

"No," Jon said. "Only Strickland should know of your existence, and even he I would not have told of your dreams. The high officers of the Golden Company know that there is a plot to take Westeros in place, but they must have assumed the campaign closer to Kings Landing. Beginning in the North would be…"

"Unprecedented," Haldon finished.

"Magister Illyrio may be playing us false as well," Aegon said. "He may claim he offered the Golden Company greater pay, but then advise Harry Strickland to refuse as means to divert us from this course."

In fact, it was possible even that they all were playing him false, a tiny, dark part of himself said. Placating him, assuring him that they believed and shared in his convictions, all while they conspired to hold him in place while Varys and Illyrio moved their pieces about the Cyvassse board.

He shook his head. No, he thought. He would not believe such poison. That was the route that had led his grandfather to madness and death.

"Aye, that's possible," Duck said. Duck had had little contact with Illyrio, and so knew him primarily by reputation. "The habit of merchants is not honesty. Liars and thieves, the lot of them."

They sat in silence then.

Jon had remained confident that the Golden Company would follow them north, even though negotiations had clearly dragged on. To have nothing to show in exchange for so many moons was disheartening. Aegon trusted in Jon, his father in all but blood and Hand in all but name, and he knew that despite his many lessons and learnings, he was inexperienced in the politicking a task such as courting the Golden Company would have required.

But Jon could not do it.

So, what now?

"What is a conqueror without his army!" Aegon roared. He would have thrown something were there anything within reach. Then he fell back onto the bed, blue strands clenched between his fingers and head in his hands. His breathing slowed.

It was Lemore who finally spoke, voice soft. "Your dreams have grown more common, haven't they?" She was ever the one he confided such matters to.

"Yes," he replied, removing his hands. He sat up straighter, and grasped his knees instead, clenching hard. "Most mornings, I awake cold, no matter how high the fire is kept, no matter the blankets I wear… Lately, I've fallen more than flown. And, always, always, I see those eyes."

Duck drummed his fingers on his legs. Lemore sat quietly, eyes downcast. Jon began to leaf through the stack of letters again. Haldon stroked his chin.

"Mayhaps they the Golden Company wouldn't believe a duck…" Haldon began.

Duck picked it up, "…But they may believe a dragon."

Jon looked up from his letters, eyebrows furrowed. "What do you propose?"

"We go to the Wall, assess the truth of the matter, and then petition the Golden Company again should Aegon's dreams prove to be truth," the Halfmaester said.

It was odd to hear Haldon suggest a course of action so seemingly daring, as he was one of the voices of reason in the party. It stirred something within Aegon. While the idea of fleeing to Westeros on his own had appealed to him some, he truly believed he would have had an army at his back given enough time. He was under no delusions that one man could fight against whatever it was that slept beyond the Wall.

But now that the prospect of an army had been taken from him, the appeal to sally forth without it returned.

"Are you ill, Haldon?" Jon accused, "The Night's Watch is a band of rapers, poachers, and cutpurses! You would trust them to not murder Aegon in his sleep? Or worse?"

"Aemon wrote back to you, did he not?" Aegon said, jumping to Haldon's defense, "We've amassed quite a store of goods: quality steel, furs, wool, even timber. Buy up some salted meats and flour and before we take ship and it would replenish their stores considerably! We come to the Wall bearing gifts, with the promise of even greater aid in the future, and we should be honored guests!"

"But it's madness." Jon turned to Lemore, "Lady Lemore, tell–"

"Would the Golden Company refuse me, if I came to them, telling them that I witnessed dead men walking and a terror only they might put down?" Aegon interrupted.

Or I might simply lie, he thought, and claim that I saw such things to Strickland.

…No, he could never do that. What good was the word of a king who would lie in such a manner?

Jon looked thoughtful, but still indignant. "… Harry Strickland is a craven copper counter. Like as not, the entire effort to seat you on the Iron Throne is of too much risk for him. Blackheart would have answered your call, no matter the circumstances."

"But his officers," Duck said, "Many of them are still from Blackheart's day..."

Aegon stood up then, back straight. "I will sit by no longer, Jon," he said, his voice clear of doubt, "I have waited long enough. We tried it your way, and now we shall try it mine. Unless you wish to chain me, I will go to the Wall with or without you."

I am a man grown, and rightful king besides.

Jon rose too, but he was no longer taller than Aegon. Gone were the days he would be cowed by Jon's physical presence alone. His mouth set and eyes firm, Jon appeared ready to argue. But what escaped his taut lips was, "Very well."

"Very well?" Aegon asked, almost not believing that it could be so easy.

"Very well," Jon confirmed. "I told you we would spend a time in Braavos. It has been a time, and I am a man of my word."

He turned to Haldon. "Halfmaester, find us a suitable ship." Then Lemore, "Lady Lemore, suitable foodstuffs for the Watch are needed. Take Aegon, he knows these canals better than most, and he must practice his Braavosi."

"And me?" Duck asked.

Jon shrugged. "Continue as usual, and be prepared to fill that ship's hold. We have much to carry."

Aegon smiled.

---

It took only a few days to find a suitable ship, despite the unpopularity of Eastwatch-by-the-Sea as a destination. The fact that the creaky old vessel bore the name Seadragon felt most propitious to Aegon. Another day of loading every last crate of weapons, clothing, materials, and food (Lemore and Aegon had found a merchant willing to part with a considerable amount of food easily enough). Whether or not Illyrio truly put stock in Aegon's claims of prophetic dreams, he had sent a profound amount of gold along to them nonetheless.

Of course, "profound" to Aegon was seemingly coppers to Illyrio.

In less than a week from their decision, they were again soaring across open water. Aegon felt the ocean breeze catching his dyed blue hair, he had not had it trimmed in some time, so it whipped around quite spectacularly. He closed his eyes and relished the feeling of truly moving. He had atrophied in Braavos, but again he was living, moving.

Aegon hoped the seas played nice.

 

[SRWG]

Chapter V: Visions in Flame​

Stannis Baratheon remembered the day he ceased to believe in the gods of his fathers all too clearly. His belief had shattered with the Windproud in the waters of Shipbreaker Bay. All he received in exchange for the death of his parents and the shaking of his very world was a mad fool and duties beyond his years; for he had been the Lord of Storm's End in all but name while Robert cavorted in the Eyrie.

The Seven-faced God the septons and septas prattled on about would never have permitted such an exchange. This was no just god. He saw no hint of the Mother's mercy. Not one whit of the wisdom of the Crone. No Father's justice, and no Warrior's strength. No pure Maiden or Smith's ingenuity. He had seen only the Stranger's death as he gazed out from the top of Storm's End's parapets, clutching Robert's already large hand as he bawled like an infant.

Dozens had died. Lord Steffon Baratheon and Lady Cassana Estermont had perished within sight of their children. And all the gods had seen fit to offer for this great expense was a thrice damned fool.

There were no gods, he had known that even then. His tears had dried and his soul had withered, and he knew. There was no Seven, no great God above.

Stannis had spent his life absolutely certain of this fact.

Until she came.

The red priestess, with her foreign god and her visions by fire.

You are the prince that was promised, she'd said, Azor Ahai reborn, come again to put an end to the darkness for all time.

He had believed her not, but his lady wife had, and with great vigor.

Robert had been king then, though, and he had a son and heir (good or strong though, could never be words that Stannis would describe Joffrey as). But then the pieces had begun to slide into place, like a great puzzle upon which rested the fate of a kingdom. Ser Jaime the Kingslayer's sly smiles and overlong looks, the queen's spiteful glances and barely hidden scorn, her children's features so unlike those of the boy at Storm's End.

And then seemingly before Stannis had even had the time to react, Jon Arryn was dead. To his great shame, he had fled for fear of his life. He was his brother's heir then, and he knew there would be strife when the Lannister woman's treachery was revealed. He began to call his banners, grounding and gathering together every ship that laid anchor at Dragonstone. There would be war.

The cold comes, the red priestess had said, Can you feel it? Only you might forestall it.

But Robert would have remarried, surely. Renly thought Stannis a fool, but he had known of his plotting with the Tyrells, Others take them. Renly had not known of the abominations called Princes and Princess then, but he would have had a rose sit the Iron Throne with or without them. Still, Stannis would have taken this. It was Robert's right to take a queen as he willed it, it was his duty to provide the realm with an heir. He was virile, if he was nothing else. Renly would have his rose on the throne, one way or another, and Stannis would have born it.

Then His Grace King Robert was dead, with no trueborn issue to take up the realm he left behind.

Your Grace, she'd whispered, through Rh'llor you will come into your throne, the true king for all to see. I have seen it.

She showed him her power then.

False gods corrupt this land. They lurk in your godswood and in your sept. They are servants of the Great Other, leading your people astray.

So he had stood by while they burned. Charcoal and ash and smoke they became, while the red priestess proclaimed him Azor Ahai for all to see. The Warrior of Light. The Son of Fire. He pulled the burning sword from the smoking corpse of what pious souls called the Mother (who had never given him her Mercy) and held it aloft, Lightbringer, the Red Sword of Heroes, she had proclaimed. He had left behind a charred useless thing, he knew that. And his bannermen looked to him in derision, in fear, or in grim acceptance.

Selyse had even come to him then, in her fervor. She lay with him, eager to give him the son he had always yearned for. She had not given him a son, but she had given him the red priestess from the land-by-the-shadow.

For she gave him an army; the army that was his by rights, that had denied him for his brother Renly, as so many had. She gave him Storm's End, that Robert had taken from him in his fury, that was the only place he had ever considered home. She'd given it all. When the time came to claim the throne that was his, she had come.

We will win your throne Your Grace, she had proclaimed, one kingdom under one god and one king.

But he had not heeded her. Everything she had promised had come to pass, but on the eve of his ascendancy, he had faltered. He would not have had it said that he had won his throne by mischief, or that he had needed a woman to fight his battles. Stannis had paid the price for his folly. His fleet was gone. His army all but scattered. His throne firmly held by an abomination.

What might have occurred instead had she been at his side at the Blackwater? Fire was her domain. Could she have turned the wildfire against the enemy? Could she have foreseen the danger? Would they have had warning of the Tyrell host?

The questions and possibilities gnawed at him, tearing him up from the inside. He ground his teeth.

Before, he had brooded over the great Painted Table of Aegon the Conqueror. The dragonlord had planned his conquest from the seat Stannis himself had sat upon. Some part of him, the fanciful boy he had been for an instant in his early childhood, perhaps, had felt a certain pride, a kinship. The Dragon Kings were gone, yes, but he would follow in their footsteps, and claim his kingdom at the same table Aegon himself had once used to forge seven kingdoms into one.

Now, he brooded before the fire. He had not followed in the footsteps of Aegon the Conqueror, but Aegon the Uncrowned. His hopes had been dashed at the mouth of the Blackwater Rush rather than above the God's Eye, but the throne eluded him as it once had the son of Aenys.

Stannis clutched at the sword sheathed at his hip. Lightbringer, she had called it. The same name as the sword of legend. The same name as the charred wreck he had left plunged on the beaches of Dragonstone. He unsheathed it then, the metal sliding softly against the fur that lined the inside of the scabbard. It was a fine blade, of castle forged steel. It was simple in its construction, but fine, and fit for a king he'd thought.

But above all else, the blade shone. Red, gold, orange, yellow. Every color that found its birth in fire could be seen shining from the blade of Lightbringer. The large room was brighter for the drawing of the blade, and he found that his eyes even stung slightly to look upon it.

He knew the stories though, he knew that this was no true blade of fire. This was not the Red Sword of Heroes. He held his left hand against the blade, finding it as cold as any steel had ever been. Where there was no heat, there could be no fire, he knew this.

Still, the blade shone. If nothing else, it was proof of the red priestess's power. In all his years he had never seen a septon perform such a "trick".

Stannis held the sword high, bathing in its great light.

Lightbringer of legend his blade may not be, his Lightbringer would serve.

He sheathed the blade, and the room was darker for it. He shivered slightly despite himself.

His gaze returned to the fire.

The flames danced in the brazier the red priestess had requested be placed in the room. It was another reminder of her presence, of the power she bore. The flames were red, as her god was. Then yellow, as the banner of his fathers. Orange, as Bryce Caron had been before his death upon the shores of the Blackwater. Orange then yellow then red then back. He felt the heat on his face. It was pleasant, as few things were in this castle.

An unpleasant castle for an unpleasant man, some man had said, of this he had no doubt.

He lost himself in those flames. Flames had not felled his parents, that had been the ocean and the sky. The gods that they believed protected them had failed, and they perished beneath the waves.

Flames had lost him the Blackwater, he knew, but was it not justice? The red priestess had given him everything, and yet when the time had come for the Iron Throne to be his, he had forsaken her and her fiery god. And so his greatest failure was writ in flames and burning hulls. He saw wood crackle before him, spitting sparks as it broke apart in the brazier. Burning, burning.

A better man than Imry Florent would have seen the Lannister ploy coming, would not have charged headlong into the mouth of the Rush. Ser Davos would have seen it. But his men would not have had it, for Davos was born low and the Florents were among the most puissant of his banners. Due must needs be paid, and so Imry Florent was his admiral. And so his fleet went up in flames. Flame that shone like terrible emeralds then. Green, as Renly's armor had been.

Red flames now. Then orange and yellow. Then red.

Davos was gone now, and four of his sons too, if the counts were correct. Devan stood loyally outside the door he knew, ready with the guards to turn away any callers. Loyal, as Davos and his sons had been as Imry Florent turned his fleet into cinders.

If he had been like Robert, then he too would have perished at the Blackwater. Always at the front he had been, flying into a battle rage so fierce, that "Demon" was almost not enough to describe it. His men had loved him for it. Their lord and then king fighting in the muck with them, taking wounds as any common man would. A god and a demon in the armor of house Baratheon. A warrior where Stannis was a commander.

None spoke of his command as they spoke of Robert and his warhammer. He had fought from the back, as he always had, and for that he had survived the wildfire. For that, he was able to retreat when Tywin Lannister and the Tyrell host arrived, and was not captured or killed as so many others had been. For that, his kingdom would never love him. It was not the stuff of songs.

Had he been in the van, holding Lightbringer high, might their morale have held? Could Tywin Lannister have been held at bay? Would his kingdom love him then, as they had Robert?

Red then yellow then orange. The flames whirled this way and that, casting great shadows about the painted table.

Robert had always wanted to be loved, and for that he met his demise at the end of a boar. His kingdom was in tatters, and Stannis was left to pick up the pieces, to fix the mess he left behind. And Renly–

Yellow then orange then red.

Red.

Stannis saw himself then, a great fiery crown about his temples. It was a true fire, this crown. It was not the imitation wrought in gold his wife and her priestess had bestowed upon him. He was all in black with a great cloak of gold at his back. The fire leapt and danced at his brow. It should have burned, but it didn't. Antlers, large and fierce grew from the roaring crown. He was a terrible sight to behold, this king in fire.

The king withdrew his sword from his scabbard, and Stannis saw that it was no sword at all. It was a hilt without a blade.

Until it wasn't. A blade came to life suddenly, emerging from the hilt in a sickening stream of fire. He pointed the sword skyward then. Fire from his crown and antlers mingling with the blaze of the blade.

Stannis heard a roaring then, but if it was the fire or something else he could not make out.

Two vast stone pillars fell to either side of the blazing king.

Shadows cast by the king danced against them, and without warning he saw that they were not pillars at all, but limbs. He saw a claw at the end of them, and he saw veins. Fire seemed to ripple through the veins of the great limbs. Wings, he realized. They connected to a long and sinewy body, its scales shining colorlessly in the king's light.

His breath caught–it was a dragon. A boundless beast of fire made flesh.

Six eyes shone with predatory light.

The dragon had three heads.

The king's crown erupted then, and fire fell from his brow, rippling down the side of his face and onto his neck and scorching the skin wherever it went.

The dragon took flight somehow, its immense size impeding its flight little.

The king pointed the sword at Stannis, its flames leaping out at him, beckoning him.

For an instant, he saw snow–

"Your Grace," a high voice called from beyond the door. It was Devan.

The dragon and the king with his terrible crown were gone, the snow scattered.

"The Lady Melisandre begs pardon," Devan said, voice unsure.

Stannis waited.

"She requests an audience."

Stannis took a deep breath and finally tore his gaze from the fire. "Send her in, Devan,"

The oaken doors groaned open, and Lady Melisandre strode into the Chamber of the Painted Table, purpose and power evident in every long-legged step. Before the doors clattered shut, he saw a glimpse of his squire staring at the red priestess with something approaching awe.

She was clad in a gown of her usual sort. Red silks and velvets and baring more cleavage than was necessary for a woman as pious as she. Her hair glimmered like burnished copper in the firelight, her red eyes shining like the ruby she wore at her throat. Stannis was at times still struck by her beauty.

Though only for an instant; he was not Robert.

"Your Grace," she said, bowing. When she stood, she caught his eyes and smiled, her red lips curving. "Are you well?"

Stannis broke from her and stared over the Painted Table. He ground his teeth. "Well? I plan war with less than two thousand men. If that is well, then I would not see unwell." He had planned nothing, in truth. Men whispered of his "brooding", he knew, but no word fit it quite so well as that, and so it was. He had brooded.

Melisandre stepped closer. "It is most dark before the dawn, yes, but the dawn shall rise all the same, Your Grace," she said, her deep voice melodious, "for you are Azor Ahai, the beloved of Rh'llor, and you shall make it so."

Stannis slammed his hands on the Painted Table, the three hundred years of varnish smooth beneath his palms. "I need an army, not words," he growled. "I am no king if I cannot take my throne. What good is a king with no army?"

She said nothing.

"Could you have stopped the wildfire?" He asked.

She smiled again then. "If Rh'llor willed it. Fire is his, no matter the color."

A non-answer.

At times, he still doubted her power. A lifetime of skepticism had not made a man that believed easily out of the dour boy he had started as. The way she spoke at times, her evasiveness, her promises of great reward when none had ever been dealt him. It warred with the magics he had born witness to. Especially…

"I looked into the flames," he said, unsteady despite himself. It was a waking nightmare, like as not. She looked at him probingly, and he looked aside so as to lose her gaze. "In the fire, I saw... images, I suppose. Images that could not be."

Lady Melisandre didn't immediately reply, so he looked back to her.

She smiled widely at him, her full lips curving with happiness, her eyes shining. The red priestess smiled routinely, but hers was a smile filled with knowing, often condescending knowledge. This was nothing of the sort. It was the smile of a maiden; it was a smile of genuine joy.

It was a smile Selyse had never rewarded him with, nor he her. Not even when she had placed Shireen in his arms on the morn of her birth.

"The Lord of Light's visions are rarely simple to read, Your Grace," she said, almost breathless. "But always, they are true."

A burning crown and sword. A three headed dragon. Snow, he thought, frowning.

Her smile faltered. "Your Grace?"

Stannis was no fool, the imagery was plain enough and none of what he had seen in the fire could be described as a good omen to his eyes. If any part of it was true, then… He shook his head. "What tidings do you bring that you sought me out, my lady?" Stannis said instead, ignoring her implied question and staring back to the fire.

Melisandre straightened, her joy vanishing as if it had never been. She was nearly as tall as Selyse, but Stannis was closer to six and a half feet than not, so still he towered over her. "Your onion knight lives," she said, her voice neutral.

He jerked his head to her, not having expected such a thing in the least. It had been weeks since the Blackwater, that he had survived was a miracle... His jaw set, and his brow furrowed. It was good news, yes, but… "How do you know such a thing?"

"Because he seeks to kill me," Lady Melisandre said, as if it were of no concern. "The flames are ever clear when my life is in peril."

His jaw set harder. His teeth ground. Of course. "This will not be; have Ser Axell apprehend him before he enters the keep," Stannis replied, his tone a forced cool. Beneath, his fury burned hot.

She bowed. "Your Grace, your concern is appreciated," she said, the slightest bit of mischief tugging at her lips. "I will let no harm come to him," she continued, "Ser Davos still has a role he must needs serve."

Lady Melisandre stepped yet closer to him. She placed a soft hand on the small of his back and smiled the same winsome smile. "As I do," she said, her red eyes dancing in the firelight.

Stannis Baratheon did not move away.

 

[SRWG]

Chapter VI: Stone Dragons​

Shireen hated the gargoyles perched all over the castle. She loved the stories of dragons and princes and princesses and everything else that came from this island and its castles, but the grotesque stone creations that littered the walls and battlements of Dragonstone haunted her every step. She had nightmares of those dragons, more often than not. She dreamt of a fire coming alive within the stone beasts, and then them beginning to move.

Her worst dreams had come when her father was gone, when he'd left to win his throne. "Hold Dragonstone," he'd said, "when next we meet, it will be in the Red Keep." She had hugged him fiercely then, and he had jerkingly patted her shoulder until mother called her away. Only, he came back. It was several days before she had managed to catch sight of him though, and it was not for more than instant. Father never lied… but he had come back to Dragonstone.

So many others hadn't come back, and mother had been glad to see that the Onion Knight was one of those men. Handsome Lord Velaryon, crotchety Lord Celtigar, swaggering Aurane Waters (who had been kind, in his own way), fierce Lord Caron, and countless others. She didn't know them all, but mother had been diligent in her instruction. She was her father's heir, and she had to know his bannermen.

Devan had returned though, and for that she was glad. He was one of her father's squires, and he approved of him. Maybe the king saw in him the son her mother had never given him. She liked Devan well enough; he was always kind and courteous, and was as loyal to her father as his own had been.

Cousin Edric had made it easier than it might have been. He was two old years older than her, but they were still close. Mother disapproved of him, almost as much as he she did Patchface, but that was because he was a bastard, not because he was a fool or mad. Edric was brusque and very rowdy, but she liked him. He had her ears and her hair, and he laughed loudly and often.

He had bragged about being the king's son, but she was the current king's daughter so she made sure he knew that too.

Pylos clapped his hands suddenly, and she was shaken from her thoughts with a girlish squeak. Her parchment was blank. Edric smirked at her from the next seat. His parchment bore some scratchings, but she knew that he didn't have the answer either. Despite his years on her, she was the more intellectual of the two. Devan was somewhat better than Edric, and he learned with them most days, but he had been called away.

"Princess," Maester Pylos said gently, "You must remain focused. When you run your household, it will be of great importance that you know your sums. If you are to rule after His Grace, then it is only that much more important."

Shireen frowned. I know that, she thought morosely, I only slept poorly yesterday. She had dreamt of a dragon again. Great and terrible and three-headed. It wanted to eat her.

Pylos strode to Edric's side of the large desk the two of them shared. He snatched Edric's parchment, ignoring his indignant squawk, and studied what the boy had written. Pylos's kind face was marred with disappointment and he shook his head.

"Edric, what was Jurne teaching you at Storm's End?" he asked, exasperated.

Edric grinned. "He tried to teach me, I simply didn't want to be taught!" He laughed loudly, as if that was something he should be proud of.

Shireen smiled despite herself. Lessons were important, but when Edric laughed it was hard not to share in his joy. Poor Uncle Renly had always been permissive, so if Edric wanted to run about and play knights at all times of the day, Renly surely let him. It was no wonder he was so wild.

"You may not run a household, but you may captain a household's guard, or serve as castellan one day," Pylos said. What he didn't say was clear to Shireen, Because you are a bastard. "No lord worth his land desires a lackwit castellan," he finished.

"Fine then! Explain it again, I'll get it this time." Edric rose to challenges, that was another trait that made her cousin so fun to spend time with. If Shireen said 'I bet you couldn't climb that tree,' he would reply 'Of course I could!' and try his hardest. She had never had that sort of relationship before, not even with Patchface.

She and cousin Myrcella had shared many interests, and got along very well, but father said she should not think of her as a cousin any longer. Edric was her cousin though, without a doubt, and neither father nor mother could take that from her.

Shireen quickly worked through the problem when Pylos introduced it again, and when she showed him her answer, she was rewarded with his serene smile. Maester Pylos was very nice, but she still found herself missing Cressen, even after all these months since he choked. He had been very old, she knew, and frail, but he'd still had some years in him left he'd always said. His death at that feast had left her inconsolable for days when she found out. Pylos had been on Dragonstone even before Cressen's death, but Cressen had taught her personally. It was a change that had taken her considerable time to become accustomed to.

While she was proficient in sums, Shireen's true passions were stories and history. She had taken to books early, about as soon as she could make out the letters. At first, she mostly admired the pictures; the knights and their princesses, and the dragons and the battles. But, soon enough, she had improved, and could begin to read in earnest.

There was so much sadness in the world; so much war, death, and tragedy. It made her feel better, at times (which almost made her feel worse in a way). She knew she would never be a fair princess, that people would never look on her with awe; her grayscale saw to that. But through history, she knew that others had had it far worse, and many had persevered through terrible circumstances.

Alysanne quarreled with her own parents over her love for Jaehaerys, but went on to become one of the best queens the Seven Kingdoms ever saw. The thought of the beautiful Queen Alsyanne on her progresses through the kingdoms atop Silverwing, was one that made her shiver with delight. And there was Orys Baratheon, shielding Argella Durrendon from the eyes of those who had stripped her nude and offered her up in surrender. He wrapped her in his cloak and took her to wife, and through their union, Shireen's own line came to be. He had taken her words and her sigil as his own, and through them, the Storm Kings of old lived on.

But for every happy ending, there were many that were not. The story of what some called the "Dance of the Dragons", but others called "The Dying of the Dragons" was long and terrible, and had been one of Shireen's greatest challenges. The betrayals and murders and death had been almost too much for her.

She tried to keep in mind the good stories: the Alysannes and Argellas, and not the bad ones like Rhaenyra.

Edric finally produced the correct answer, but it had taken him twice as long as it had her. He roared in triumph nonetheless, which caused Pylos to shake his head and release an exasperated breath.

"I suppose that is well enough for today," Pylos said when Edric settled down. "You two run along and play, now. I have other tasks to attend to." He gathered up their parchments and quills and sent them away with a shooing motion. It had been a relatively short lesson today, but she did not mind.

Shireen laughed and leaped out of her seat. It was somewhat unladylike, but Pylos and Cressen before him forgave her when she lapsed. Edric enjoyed it when she threw aside propriety. Her cousin was already running ahead, so she had to hike up her skirts some to catch up. A stray raven quorked from the corner of the room as they exited through the aged wooden door.

The Sea Dragon Tower was tall and winding, and like many things on Dragonstone, carved in the shape of a great dragon. Unlike many of them, this one was serene, looking out to the sea with seeming longing. Shireen found the larger dragons to be somewhat less scary than the smaller ones throughout the castle. Aerea had mastered Balerion after all, so too could she master the immense stone dragons of Dragonstone.

She chased him down the turnpike stairs giggling and puffing. Others may have found such stairs perilous, but she had been scaling steps such as these since she had first walked. But where she firmly trounced her cousin in studies, Edric had her clearly outclassed in athletics, even disregarding the limitations of skirts. He was far ahead of her, and she chased as if she were right on his tail. She knew where he was going, in any case.

Soon enough, they were sprinting through the Stone Drum, passing stone faced men-at-arms and strutting queen's men with their sewn-on hearts of Rh'llor. None of them would dare stop the Princess and her companion though, except mother, father, or perhaps her uncles of Florent. Hoping to include Devan in their games, they passed the looming doorway of the Chamber of the Painted Table, but saw that it was guarded by two of her father's men alone; the king's squire was nowhere to be seen.

She rounded a corner and nearly smacked straight into Edric's back. "Why did y– " she exclaimed, before noticing what had blocked her cousin.

Ser Richard Horpe stood before the two of them, dressed in plate even at rest on Dragonstone. His pockmarked face and hard eyes were a threatening sight to Shireen, even as she knew that one did not choose their face. He bowed when he made eye contact with Shireen, "Princess," he said courteously (if stiffly). "Your mother requests your presence, she asks that you wait in your chambers." He looked down to Edric, but said nothing.

She grabbed at her cousin's hand and shook it. "I'll meet you in Aegon's Garden later," she said, offering a smile. "Go hit someone with a sword!"

Edric rarely required much prodding when it came to violence, and so with a smile, a wave, and a "Until later, Princess!" he was off to the training yard.

Ser Richard held out an arm. "Would you like an escort, my lady?"

She shook her head. "Thank you Ser, but I know the way," she replied. Shireen curtsied to the hard knight, who nodded in deference, and then she was off toward her chambers on the lower levels of the Stone Drum. Dragonstone was something of a winding castle, especially compared to the relatively simple construction of the main body of the Red Keep, but she had spent most of her life in the Valyrian stronghold, so it was of little concern for her to navigate.

She passed yet more men-at-arms as she made her way through the halls and past the countless gargoyles, hellhounds, manticores, and dragons. There were less people about than there had been before the battle, she knew. The bustle of men in armor and the loud discussion of battle plans had made Dragonstone a livelier place. It had made it easier for her to escape her nightmares. But now it was quiet again, and so she found herself running rather than walking.

What does mother want? She thought, Is it about Uncle Imry? Shireen had not known him well, but he was her mother's brother, and mother had been very distraught at his death on the Blackwater, and had retreated even further into the embrace of the red woman and her fires. Shireen had never had a brother, so she didn't know how she would react to losing one.

If she lost Edric, or even Patches, she would be sad though, she knew. Very sad.

A queen's man waited outside the gaping dragon's maw that was the entrance to her chambers. In some cruel twist of Valyrian fate, the stone about the door to her room had been shaped into a fierce dragon's mouth; the door seemingly leading into the beast's throat. The ancient Valyrian stonemasons probably thought it harmless fun, as they had in their creation of the dragonshapes throughout the rest of the castle, but Shireen found that she didn't like it much. Every night she had to be eaten by a dragon in order to go to bed.

"Mayhaps naming the dragon should make it a friendlier face," her mother had told her once, when she had cried at the sight of it during a terrible thunderstorm. Thus it had become Silverwing, in honor of Good Queen Alysanne's beautiful companion. Her father had grimaced when she told him of it and had asked why she had not chosen a more Baratheon sounding name.

"Because Alysanne is my favorite," she'd told him brightly. And besides, according to Pylos, Orys Baratheon himself was a Targaryen bastard, and her own great grandmother had been a Targaryen.

When she approached Silverwing's maw, Ser Patrek bowed to her. "Princess," he said. Patrek of King's Mountain was a large, clean shaven man. He had a haughtiness about him, almost like Edric, but he was not quite so kind as her cousin. Still, he was always courteous. His cloth-of-silver surcoat glimmered, even in the darkness of the hall, but it was the fiery heart of Rh'llor that stood out most.

He opened the door for her; she entered.

The first thing she noticed was that the fire had been kept burning high. Dalla was dutiful in keeping her hearth high, even when Shireen intended to spend her day in the Maester's Library or Aegon's Garden. She knew that her mother liked to keep the fire particularly roaring though, ever since the red woman had come to Dragonstone. In truth, Shireen did not mind it. Dragonstone was a dark place and the fires made it brighter, which she appreciated.

Two chairs had been pulled in front of the fire: one highbacked and austere, and one shorter and soft.

Her words of greeting to her mother caught in her throat as the figure stood and revealed herself. It was the Lady Melisandre, not the Lady of Dragonstone. "Lady Melisandre," she said, unsure.

The red priestess was tall and beautiful, with creamy white skin and long hair that flowed like fire. She stood out starkly against the form of her mother at their nightfires, with her skinny frame and plain looks. She stood out even more against Shireen.

"Princess," she replied in a soothing tone, her voice deep and accented. "Might you sit by the fire with me for a time?" The red priestess gestured to the smaller chair, her long dagged sleeve near touching the floor.

Shireen nodded, but took slow steps toward the chair. She had never spent much time alone with the Lady Melisandre, almost always in the company of her mother as well if at all. She was threatening even as she smiled, scary in a way that the grotesques littered throughout the castle were not. She settled into the soft chair as the red priestess sat gracefully back into the larger chair.

She had chosen her preferred chair at the least. Shireen preferred to read in the Maester's chambers of library, but when she did choose to spend time in her chambers, this was the chair she reclined in. She looked to the beautiful woman beside her, but received only a smile in return.

Melisandre stared into the fire for a time then. Enough time passed that Shireen found her gaze drawn to the crackling hearth as well. Mercifully, it was not carved into the shape of a dragon.

Finally, the deep voice of the red woman broke above the pleasant hum of the fire. "Your day has been pleasant, Princess?"

Shireen nodded, but found herself struggling to find appropriate words. "After I broke my fast, I… spent the morning with Maester Pylos, learning sums with Edric and Devan… But Devan was called away…" The fire hissed as a log cracked. "I was to play with Edric at Aegon's Garden, but Ser Richard called me here." She didn't say that she had been led to believe her mother would be waiting for her.

"Queen Selyse asked that I talk with you," Lady Melisandre replied, her eyes never leaving the fire. "I will not hold you long, frolic in the Conqueror's wood you shall." The red priestess smiled at that, letting the fire do some talking for a time. "Your cousin… He is King Robert's son, you know this?" she asked.

"Yes," Shireen said, "He's a bastard, but I know his mother is a Florent like my own."

"Do you like him?"

Shireen turned toward the priestess, but saw that the fire still held her gaze. "I do," she said, "We have fun, and… he doesn't care about my… my grayscale."

She tried not to think too much about her grayscale. She had been marked with it for as long as she could remember, but always it was what people noticed first about her. Edric had simply asked, "What's wrong with your face?" and when she explained, had replied, "I'll have my own scars someday, from fighting! You just have a head start!"

"Some might say that his claim to the throne is greater than your own," Lady Melisandre said, "for he is a king's son, while you are a daughter."

Shireen's brow furrowed. She didn't even know if she wanted the throne. Father had never been a joyous man, but he had become only more solemn after the death of King Robert, and after the battle… But she had no brother, and unless her mother could give her father one, it would be her duty to sit the throne after her father. She had not asked for it, but both of her parents had impressed upon her the importance of duty. Neglecting it brought only ruin, they said.

"But your father must win his rightful throne first," she continued. "He has been dealt a grievous blow, and he knows not the path forward." The red priestess finally turned to Shireen, her red eyes boring into her own blues. "If you could help your father, would you, Princess?"

Her reply was quick. "Of course! How might I?"

Lady Melisandre turned back to the blaze, raising a long graceful hand to the hearth. "I know you have not welcomed to the Lord of Light into your heart, as your mother the queen has," she said.

"Would that help my father, truly?" Shireen asked.

The red priestess withdrew her hand. "I know not," she said. "His Grace, the king, struggles with his destiny. He is Azor Ahai come again, but still, he doubts."

Azor Ahai…

"And yet, Rh'llor has graced him with visions all the same. Your father looked into the fire and he saw, Princess, as I do." Lady Melisandre stood up suddenly, drawing closer to the fire reverently. She stared deeply into the conflagration. "Men whisper that I bewitched your mother and father, but I did not… I merely showed them the Lord's light." She turned and beckoned to Shireen.

Shireen felt a chill crawl up her back. Still, she stood up, and took careful steps forward. The red woman grasped her hand and she shivered; her skin was warm.

"I would not force you to believe," she said solemnly. "But I would ask that you look into the fires, Princess. Your father sees, and his king's blood flows through your veins, my lady. If Rh'llor has granted him the sight, then perhaps he has granted it to you as well." She clenched Shireen's hand tightly in her own, then released it.

"I only ask that you look," she said imploringly, red eyes piercing her soul. "Look, and heed."

She stepped away from the fire then and bowed deeply. "Now I bid you good day, Princess." In an instant, Shireen was alone in her room, still standing in front of the fire, puzzled more than anything.

Would looking into the fire help father? Was that what she had meant? What did father see? Father was not prone to dreams and nightmares, as she was (or so mother had said), so if he saw something in the fire, it would have to be true, would it not?

Shireen had not followed her mother into the faith of Rh'llor. The great nightfires and foreign songs had scared Shireen some, but that was not what kept her from following her mother. She had liked the Seven, and the old sept too. And now both were gone. Septon Barre had been kind, but he was sent away. Maester Cressen hadn't liked Lady Melisandre either, she could tell.

"You will come to Rh'llor in your own time," her mother had insisted, but Shireen didn't know that for sure. She had liked what she had, why change?

But if it could help father, she supposed she could look into the fire for a time, at least.

She settled back into her chair, relishing the feeling of its softness. The wood in the hearth crackled and popped. The fire danced, and she found herself drawn to it.

Look and heed.

Had father heeded what he'd seen? When had he seen it? Was that why Devan was called away, maybe?

Shireen wondered what her cousin was doing. He was probably beating up on some cook's boy, or some unlucky squire; for he was big and strong for his age. It had been a relatively short lesson with Pylos today, so there was still plenty of daylight left for their games. Maybe Devan would be done with what he had to do too.

And Patches! He was probably in the kitchen. It was no wonder he was so fat when he was always sneaking snacks from the cooks. The four of them could play in the garden. She thought it would be fun, but Devan wasn't quite so fond of Patches.

The shadows playing on the walls brought to mind the song that Patches had taken to singing. She hoped he wouldn't today.

The shadows come to dance my lord, dance my lord, dance my lord.

There was a sharp crack and the fire spat fiercely.

The shadows come to stay my lord, stay my lord, stay my lord.

Silverwing came alive, then. Stone into flesh into fire. She was beautiful and fierce and everything Shireen felt that she was not. She flew about the spires and gargoyles of Dragonstone, circling up and around the Dragonmont faster than she thought possible. She shone in the light, glinting like so many silver pieces. She settled down into one of the many courtyards of the castle.

Shireen saw that it was Aegon's Garden, and marveled that Silverwing could even weave her great bulk between the trees. She sauntered through the tall dark trees and the cranberry bushes and found her way to the wreckage of the sept.

She settled atop the pulled down stones and curled up, wrapping her tail around what had been the site of Jaeherys and Alysanne's fateful marriage. Smoke trailed from her nostrils, and her eyes closed. She looked almost like a bird on its nest, Shireen thought with a laugh.

Belatedly, Shireen realized that if her Silverwing had come alive, then she was in its belly.

She started with a yelp. The fire still cracked and hissed before her and her heart raced. She remembered Lady Melisandre's words.

I have to tell Edric.

---

Shireen had first run to the training yard, but found that he wasn't there. A breathless interrogation of a bruised young squire revealed that Edric had already had his fun for today, and he had strutted victoriously to Aegon's Garden to wait for her. She apologized to the boy for her cousin's roughness and continued on toward the wooded Garden.

She crossed the Dragon's Tail and made her way to the Conqueror's grove some time later than she might have usually. She had been stopped by a gaggle of queen's men, who showered her in salutations and well wishes. Propriety demanded she return the niceties, and she didn't have Edric to use as an excuse this time.

When she found her cousin, he was smacking a poor tree with a stick.

"What did the tree do to you?" She asked, shocking him from his violence.

"It gave me a look I didn't like," said Edric, growling. Then he laughed and tossed the stick to her.

She caught it, but only barely. "How did it give you a look? We don't have a heart tree here!"

Edric looked confused. "We don't?"

"This is why you have to pay attention to Maester Pylos's lessons, cousin," Shireen said, laughing. The godswood in the Red Keep as well as the one in Storm's End both had heart trees (and both had been nearly as unsettling as Dragonstone's gargoyles, with their red sap flowing like bloody tears from carved eyeholes), but the Targaryens had never worshipped the Old Gods. Since the whole castle was built by them, it made sense that they had cared little to observe rituals of the First Men. The sept had come later, she knew.

Edric waved a hand dismissively, smirking. "I know how to fight, that's good enough for me." He knew that it flustered her to disregard higher pursuits, so she rewarded him with a swat at his ankle, which he dodged nimbly. "What did the queen want?" he asked.

That pleased Shireen. He rarely used her title, instead simply calling her "your mother" or "Lady Mustache". She dropped the stick. "It wasn't my mother," she said, "it was the Lady Melisandre."

A hungry look appeared in her cousin's eyes. "Hmm? What did she want?"

"To have a few words with me." She didn't want to tell him everything, he didn't have the patience for such things anyway. "But when she left, I looked into the fire and–"

He quirked an eyebrow. "–Why'd you do that? Trying to hurt your eyes?"

Shireen frowned. "No, cousin. The Lady Melisandre sees things in her fires, so I thought I should try."

"But I thought you didn't believe in her fire god?"

"I don't." I think. "But she said my father had looked into the fires as well."

That got his interest. "The king?" he exclaimed, leaning forward, "Did you see anything then?"

She nodded excitedly, what she saw coming back to her. "The dragon on my door came to life! It flew all around the castle and the Dragonmont and then came right here! It fell asleep on the sept. It was beautiful." It hadn't been like her other dreams of dragons, as she hadn't gotten scared until the very end.

Edric scratched his chin. It was a broad Baratheon chin, but it was not so apparent as hers. "Well then it couldn't be true then could it? The dragons are all dead, aren't they?" He looked over toward the ruins of the sept at the edges of the Garden, and then back to Shireen.

After Lady Melisandre had burned the old statues of the Seven in her grand ceremony, her mother had ordered that the sept be torn down. She intended for it to be rebuilt into a temple for Rh'llor. Her mother wanted it to be the greatest temple to the Lord of Light this side of the Narrow Sea in honor of her father's prophesied ascension. The sept had been knocked over quickly enough, but as the Battle of the Blackwater neared, the men had been needed elsewhere, and so what was left of the once beautiful sept on Dragonstone was a pile of rubble and bricks. Since the battle, none had cared enough to clear it all away; her mother had been mourning and her father brooding.

Edric suddenly walked away quickly, and she had to hike her skirts up to reach his side.

"What are you doing?"

"We're going to the sept, obviously," Edric said. "You think I pay no mind to my lessons but sometimes I listen."

"What?"

He gestured at her as he stalked between the trees. "All the dragons are dead!" he said, grabbing a few cranberries from a stray bush. "But everyone always calls people by their houses." He munched them quickly. "'We'll get those lions yet', or 'Others take those wolves' and all that sort of thing."

So? She was a stag then, or a doe.

"But Uncle Renly liked talking about the family line, and I listened every now and again. He said that his grandmother was a Targaryen, I think. The daughter of some king."

Rhaelle Targaryen, she knew. The youngest daughter of King Aegon V. She'd married Ormund Baratheon, and together they were her great grandparents, though even her father had met them only when he was very young.

"So if the dragon dragons are gone, then maybe you're the dragon?" He said, spitting out the seeds. "The one in your dream, I mean."

But then you would be a dragon too, wouldn't you? She wanted to say, but even as much as he bragged of his father, she knew that he kept himself apart from their shared history. She didn't know if visions worked like that, besides. Daenys the Dreamer had seen the Doom, and so fled from Old Valyria with her family. Why would a prophecy be so unclear?

"I don't know about that," is what she said instead.

Edric shrugged nonchalantly, "What could it hurt?"

Soon enough, they were upon the rubble of the sept at the edge of Aegon's Garden. Stones were scattered every which way, as if the builders had cared for nothing when the building was torn down. Some had been moved already, perhaps to reinforce fortifications elsewhere, but much of the material that had made up the sept was haphazardly strewn about.

Looking back to her, Edric asked, "You're sure that dragon came to the sept?" At her nod, he knelt down and began to root around in the rubble. He picked up a rock, looked at it closely, and then threw it off to the side.

"What are you looking for, cousin?"

"Anything interesting, I suppose."

Shireen knelt down too and started sifting through the stones and bricks and rocks. They wouldn't find Septon Barre's prism, for he had been allowed to take it with him when he was sent away. It surely would have been shattered amid this mess besides. This wasn't Lady's work, and certainly not something a princess should be doing, but with Edric it was fun.

It would have been more fun with Devan and Patches too, but they had not appeared. She hoped that whatever was keeping Devan was not something unfortunate. He had squire's duties, but typically he still had time to play at this hour.

Shireen grasped a smooth piece of rock and held it close. It was remarkably even-surfaced for something that had been between so much refuse. But it seemed to be nothing more than a rock, so she tossed it.

She didn't think Lady Melisandre's visions concerned smooth rocks. She didn't believe her mother would be so devout if that was all the red priestess saw in those fires.

Bricks, bricks, stones, rocks, some wood, bricks.

An hour and many bricks later, Shireen found herself very, incredibly, truly, tired. Somehow, Edric was continuing to dig.

Her fingers felt as though they were like to fall off. Her dress was filthy, her legs sore from crouching, her knees somehow scuffed through her dress, and her back ached. Mother would not be happy if she managed to catch her in the halls.

Suddenly, a stone narrowly missed her and she screamed, more from the shock than anything.

"Look out!" her cousin called belatedly.

She snatched it up off the ground and examined it, biting back the shout of indignation she wanted to unleash at Edric…

Odd…

It was unlike anything else she had seen in the ruins of the sept. It was somewhat under half the size of her head. It wasn't smooth, really, as much as it was… scaled, she supposed. Like the scalemail some men-at-arms in her father's service wore, or like the lizards that basked atop rocks on the beaches of Dragonstone. It was a deep purple too, and when she turned it in her hands, it caught the light and shone ever so slightly silver. It was more sphere than oval, or she might have thought it a stony, overlarge chicken egg

Most odd of all though, was that the stone was warm. Very warm. It had been getting cooler since autumn began, and the rest of the rubble had been cool to the touch.

"Cousin?" she called. "Might I keep this stone?"

He gave her a strange look, as if she had said outlandish. "What do I care about some pretty rock? Do I look like a girl to you?"

Shireen held onto the stone, but soon enough they abandoned their excavation, distraught that they hadn't found whatever it was her Silverwing was trying to lead her to. Maybe Lady Melisandre was wrong, and she didn't have the gift of sight. She couldn't wait to show Devan the stone though, he would surely appreciate it more than Edric had!

 

[SRWG]

Chapter VII: A King's Landing​

As it happened, the Narrow Sea had not been particularly kind to the Seadragon. It was certainly not the worst weather that Captain Gylloros had ever sailed through if he told it true, but it was no less fraying for Aegon. Harsh rains one day, blazing sun another. Billowing winds at all times, and more often than not in the opposite direction, toward Essos. They were forced to rely on oars, but laden with goods as they were, it was relatively slow going.

Aegon kept up his studies as best he could, and sparred with Duck on the deck when the weather allowed for it. Lemore had seemed comfortable enough in the frightful conditions, as did Haldon and Jon, but Duck had been more than a little disquieted.

"Remember please that I chanced Essos to avoid the Wall," Duck had said one day as they batted at each other with dulled steel (Jon did not want them risking live steel on a ship deck with the weather as poor as it was).

Aegon had laughed. "It has been years since you stepped foot in Westeros! And the Wall is a long way from Bitterbridge." There was little chance that any at the Wall would recognize Duck and demand he take the black for his crimes, particularly with the gifts they bore in hand.

The Seadragon's crew had been an interesting enough lot. Each had a story to tell, and Aegon was always willing to listen, however much it dismayed Jon. One man, Medge, had originally called the small fishing village near Eastwatch home, and had much and more to say of its quality of life; there was a reason he now spent his life rowing a merchant vessel and had not returned in many years. Another by the name of Belo hailed from Lys, but had fled his life there after accruing considerable debt in its famed pillow houses.

He and Jon had spent much of the voyage attempting to put together some semblance of a concrete plan, but in truth there wasn't much for them to discuss. They knew little of conditions at or beyond the Wall besides what Duck had heard from Ser Alliser Thorne and the whisperings from Varys' little birds while they had waited in Braavos. They would land in Eastwatch, and make their way to Castle Black as quickly as time would allow, then gather what information and evidence they could. They would attempt to convince the Watch to escort them in the lands beyond the Wall, and perhaps see the living dead in person; find out what they could and bring it all back to the Golden Company.

For all his desire to do good, Aegon knew his party of five could not fight whatever it was that lurked beyond the Wall alone. They would need the Golden Company, but for that, he would need some amount of proof. Surely the Night's Watch would help them if they knew what aid they could bring to bear.

They saw the Wall first.

The Titan of Braavos was always a pleasant sight when one made their way to the Secret City. The Braavosi kept their waters well patrolled, so there was little risk of pirates, but that fear was present to some degree no matter the waters one braved. But the Wall was something else entirely. The Wall was visible on the horizon long before the land beneath it came into view.

It shined pale blue in the sunlight as they crept ever closer.

When they came closer still, Aegon could see in detail the Wall's ending. From a distance, it was somewhat less apparent, but closer, the fact that the Wall ended at the sea-line was almost… disconcerting in a way… or foreboding.

When they were finally close enough to make out the finer details of Eastwatch-by-the-Sea, Duck had put it best.

"Looks a right shithole."

And so it did.

Even from the sea, Eastwatch was a ramshackle establishment. Wooden keeps and less than a handful of stone towers, with not a one even reaching a hundred feet by the look of it. A couple ships sat docked at its harbor. Aegon had seen many towns better fortified and more sturdily built throughout Essos (the threat of Dothraki did that, he supposed).

Still, whatever its faults, it was their destination, and it would be his first steps on the land of his birth. Their king had come home, even if they did not yet realize it.

When the Seadragon at long last slid into port after a too-long journey across the choppy waters of the Bay of Seals and beyond, Aegon had near thrown himself over the gunwale, but had been held back by Jon until the gangplank could be lowered down.

Stepping onto the dock, Aegon took a deep breath, feeling the cold air bite at his lungs. The sun shined high, though it was quickly making its way to the horizon, as it had been some hours since noon, and a few clouds dotted the far sky. This isn't so bad as my dream, he thought with some satisfaction. There is time yet.

Jon stepped out beside him, his hair freshly dyed and his brow set. Even his thick beard was blue now. Often, he had let it grow in red when he did not deign to shave it, but here in Westeros he was more recognizable, and it was cold enough that a beard was a reasonable choice.

The others followed after them quickly enough. Haldon and Duck had let their beards grow as well, though Duck had usually kept his regardless of weather. All of them had bundled themselves in wool and furs, though they had been wearing such for a time already on the open sea. The Bay of Seals was as chilly as it was choppy, and catching sick would have helped no one. Lemore in particular wore much, for she felt that the cold did not agree with her. She wore a large white robe above it, as well as her seven-pointed star pendant, to make her status as a septa plain. All of the men wore swords at their hips, and even Lemore had a dagger hidden away in her sleeves, he knew.

Aegon hopped a little, testing the sturdiness of the wooden dock beneath him. It wasn't as terrible as it looked, though he was no expert in construction. He supposed it would have to be, to have stood the test of time as it had. His left hand went to the hilt of the blade he called Brightfyre (in mocking, he insisted) and his right went to his chin, which he scratched. He too had begun to grow a beard, though it was a thin, paltry thing. It shone silver in the sunlight, but it was not near enough to waste dye on when most would mistake it for blonde.

A large man clad all in black made his way up the dock to them and Aegon let go of his sword's hilt. It wouldn't do to present a threatening image to the men they sought to aid, after all.

When the man approached closer, Aegon saw that he lacked a nose. Besides the gap in his face caused by this, he was a thickset man, with a thicker mustache that did little to disguise his deformity. Still, his eyes were not entirely suspicious as he came upon them. "What brings you to Eastwatch-by-the-Sea?" he asked. "I know every ship that comes and goes; it is not often that I spy a new hull." He looked from the five of them to the anchored Seadragon.

Jon spoke for them. "We mean to go to Castle Black," he said. "And we come bearing gifts as well …?"

"Borcas," the newly named man answered. "Head Steward of Eastwatch."

Haldon continued then. "We bring foodstuffs and materials, and would take some along to Castle Black if you would provide escort."

Borcas glanced from one of them to the next, "The Night's Watch doesn't have the luxury to refuse gifts freely given… but why?"

"I met one of your number," Duck said. "In Braavos, and he made clear the Watch's need."

"Ser Alliser?"

"Aye," Duck said, nodding.

Borcas returned the nod. "Our need is great, especially now. Come, please, I will arrange for men to bring in your cargo."

Aegon followed closely behind the noseless black brother. Haldon stayed behind to make certain the seamen handled their goods properly and that the captain was well compensated, but the rest followed behind him as well. The Wall shined and glittered.

They saw a number of sworn brothers along the docks, and yet more when they entered the keep proper. Aegon relished in the feeling of real earth (Real Westerosi land, a part of him whispererd) beneath his feet once again, for though he loved the sea and the feeling of a deck below him, after a voyage, land was always nice. But it was clear that the keep had room for more than called it home at current. Men sparred in the training yard, others carried lumber and stone to and fro, and yet more patrolled the edges. For all that there were men about, it was bizarrely quiet. An oppression hung in the air like a fog.

Borcas spoke, cutting through that oppression ever so slightly. "The mood has been poor for some time," he said. "We have heard little from the Lord Commander in some moons and many fear the worst."

"In Braavos we heard little of this, but there were rumblings of some… ranging, perhaps?" said Jon.

"The wildlings have been gathering under a new King-beyond-the-Wall, a former brother called Mance Rayder," Borcas said. "Lord Commander Mormont meant to discover the truth of the matter, and search for some missing rangers besides. Near on a third of the Watch's strength went with him, most from Castle Black and the Shadow Tower."

And they haven't heard from them? The circumstances here truly were dire. His visions had not lied in that respect.

They came upon a stone tower in somewhat better repair than the others. The Head Steward gestured up to it. "I'll have rooms prepared for you here in the Sea Tower." He made a face as he said the tower's name. "I will show you to the common hall, and I'll have a brother sent to you when the rooms are appropriate for visitors."

The common hall was only a short walk away from the thoroughly boringly named tower, and they passed by a few more burly and surly men in black. "Thank you," Aegon said to the noseless man as he waved them through. Inside, he could finally no longer see the Wall.

"If any of you desire a meal, inform Grell that you are visitors to the Watch. If he complains, tell him he can muck the stables instead if he pleases." With a chorus of gratitude from them all, the man was off, walking far more quickly than he had when he led them. He was so matter-of-fact, that Aegon almost thought him a waking dream.

Several fires burned within the large common hall, making it far warmer within than without. It was not snowing at present, which even meant that it was probably a warmer day than it might have been. Black brothers sat at tables near and far, dicing and jesting and laughing.

Jon sat at a bench farthest from any of the black-clad men, and the rest of them took a seat around him. The laughter quieted as they sat, and Aegon saw several sets of hard eyes scan their way. Jon was clearly wary, but Lemore seemed decidedly unworried. Duck quickly removed himself from the table.

"I'll see about some food," he said, "Enough for all of us."

Aegon couldn't see where the kitchen was exactly, but Duck had a nose for that sort of thing, so he was sure he'd find it soon enough. He wasn't starved, but some food certainly wouldn't hurt. He looked to the men nearest them.

Four men, all in the blacks of the Night's Watch. All four had seen more than thirty years, and one lacked an ear from what he could tell. An old set of carved dice rolled across the table again and again, to jeers and laughs and shouts of anger. Rapers and robbers they might be, but they seemed about like any other men Aegon had met, if rougher than many.

Jon tapped the table irritatedly, while Lemore sat with her arms crossed in front of her.

Aegon supposed that there must have been worse first impressions. Borcas had seemed a good enough sort, and they had not been attacked or turned away. He counted it as a fair introduction to Westeros. But judging by Jon's expressions, perhaps his own standards were simply incredibly low. Aegon was not sure of the customs of Eastwatch, so whether this was a sort of luncheon or the men in the hall had been allowed to take a break, he did not know.

Soon enough, Duck returned to the table with a few trays laden with bowls of some sort of soup and hunks of bread. The soup was allegedly mutton, but Aegon could only make out bits of turnip and cabbage, though he thought he could detect a bit of mutton in the flavor of the broth. The bread was nearing stale, but still edible enough to Aegon's standards. Truthfully, he wasn't sure if it was any better than the Seadragon's fare, but it was food and it warmed the belly.

Here, that was probably worth more than any other aspect of food.

Duck tore through the food quickly, as Aegon did. Lemore ate at a somewhat more sedate pace, while Jon fell somewhere in the middle. Aegon knew that his palate called for more than the life of a supposed sellsword had granted him (he was sure he ate fine meals at Griffin's Roost, or when he was the Mad King's Hand), but he tackled less than delicious meals as he did everything else, with dogged determination.

"I'll wait for Haldon here," Aegon said as he finished his meal. "He'll be hungry, and I have plenty time to wander later."

Jon swallowed the bread he'd torn from the hard heel and gave him a measured look. "Duck will stay with you. Lady Lemore and I will seek some loose lips among the sworn brothers. Conditions on the road, this great ranging, or whatever else they have to tell."

Aegon shrugged. He was used to Jon's protectiveness. Once upon a time it had rankled him to be seemingly coddled as much as he was (especially as he neared his majority) but when the secret came to light, it clarified everything. He was simply too valuable to be left alone most of the time. Duck was his sworn shield as much as he was his teacher in combat, so most often it was him. Which was fine by Aegon, as they had gotten along splendidly from the day they met.

Still, at times it made him feel like a particularly priceless jewel.

When Jon and Lemore finished up their food and left the common hall, Aegon found himself relaxing ever so slightly. Jon was distrustful enough of most common men that it almost bled into him at times. It was easier to return to his old persona without Jon around as a reminder of his true identity. He had spent most of his life as little more than a commoner, after all.

"How was the cook?" Aegon asked, turning to Duck.

"Oh, he was plenty pleasant," Duck replied. "Only threatened to attack me until he realized I weren't in black. As it happens, he's most gracious to visitors." He smirked.

Aegon laughed, shaking his head. He looked out to the men that were dicing nearby again, absentmindedly rubbing the rough edges of the bowl that had allegedly contained mutton soup. Their faces were lined, though how much was from age he could not know, with scars aplenty as well. One had blue eyes, another green, and the last two browns of one shade or another. Only one wore leathers that Aegon could truly call black, the other three seemed to be more gray than black to his eye, with more than a little brown staining the gray. Blood, dirt, or both? These are the sorriest crows I've seen. Every now and again, he saw them glance over to him and Duck with suspicion. These were rough men, of that much he was certain, even just by their dicing and cursing. But who was to say why they were here?

Duck would have been bound for the Wall for retaliating against a lord's son's arrogance and thievery. He may have gone too far, but he had been young and brash then, and every boy makes mistakes. Who could say how long these men had been here? They might have been young, brash boys that made a mistake once long ago, turned to cold, hard men by the great Wall above them. And here they served, never to father children or forge their own paths. Aegon frowned. It had to be a hard life here.

They had brought near as much food and supplies as they could stuff into the Seadragon. He would have to make sure that a goodly portion was left here, though he knew that more men called Castle Black home than Eastwatch, and Eastwatch had better access to supplies due to its port. If he could save them from this so-called mutton soup, then perhaps their days would be better for a time.

When Aegon couldn't freely wander, he enjoyed watching people almost as well. So he sat, engaging in idle chatter with Duck while men filtered in and out as time passed. The clatter of dice ceased when its owner left. The other three had followed after him in short order. When they passed, he heard them whisper the word "blue" among other less savory words.

Aegon frowned, and saw the knowing grin split Duck's face. It was always the hair with Westerosi men. Men of the Free Cities didn't care one whit what color a man's hair was. Even Meereenese men with their oiled horns of hair colored red or orange or gold. The only thing that ever turned heads in Aegon's direction was when they noticed he lacked the telltale Tyroshi accent that most men who chose blue for their hair bore. He had heard all too many comments on his purported lack of masculinity in the common tongue, but he had let it slide off of him. Jon would never have approved of him getting into a fight.

After all, if he got his eyes scratched out in a bar brawl, the most silver hair in the world would not be enough to prove him for Rhaegar's son.

A pair of men ambled into the hall some time later, complaining of some stairs. They settled into another table further away and began to play at cards. What do they wager, I wonder? Aegon and Duck had become entranced by the rather close game of cards when a voice cracked like a whip behind them.

Duck's hand was at his sword in admirable time, but if the man had truly wanted them dead, then the Targaryen dynasty would have ended that day most like.

"And who are you two? A brigand and his pretty lass from a pillow house?" The man all but spat. Aegon turned. The man was severe looking as any he'd seen, with long black hair gone mostly to grey, and a clean-shaven face. His mouth was thin and curved wickedly. "The Night's Watch doesn't take women. Is this what it has come–" he stopped when his gaze came to Duck. "…Ser Rolly?"

Duck let go of his sword's hilt, his green eyes meeting black. He let out something that was half sigh of relief and half bemusement. "Ser Alliser? I thought you would still roost at Castle Black?"

This is Ser Alliser, then. Duck had described him as severe; it was certainly the truth.

Ser Alliser's gaze resumed its prior hardness, its astonishment quickly replaced. "I am Eastwatch's master at arms now," he said, pride mixed with scorn. "After my foray in King's Landing."

There was a story there, that much was clear.

"The Lannister brat didn't like that hand as much as I did, I take it?"

Ser Alliser really did spit this time, and he took a seat on the other side of Duck. "I never saw the King, only the Imp," he said venomously. "That stunted halfman kept me in waiting in the worst accommodations he could find. An anointed knight! Weeks in waiting for an audience, and by the time he found it in his malformed self to receive me, the hand had rotted away to scraps and bones."

"The bones did not continue to move?" Aegon asked, genuinely curious.

The knight barely regarded him, gaze haughty as he gave his hair a second look. "And who are you, boy?" he asked, making the word part accusation, part jest, and all insult.

This time, Aegon had to try harder to not let it rouse his anger. If the man knew Duck, why would he act as such to a companion of his? He knew it showed on his face some by the smirk it brought to the man's thin lips.

"My squire," Duck answered. "Young Griff, we call him, for his father is Griff,"

"Is this the aid you have brought us?" Ser Alliser said, "A squire and a sellsword?" Even Duck seemed perturbed then, but Ser Alliser continued, "Bah. It is near as much as the crown gave us…" He turned to Aegon again. "But no, boy, as soon as the flesh and tendons were gone, the bones were as any other. And without proof of the 'wight', I had naught but stories and superstitions to persuade those self-important fools in Kings Landing."

Part of Aegon felt smugly superior to the bastard on the Iron Throne and the others who would be king, for he had come to the Watch in their need when they had not. But another part knew that it was mere chance that had brought him here. Had he not had that dream the night Duck returned, or had Duck not stumbled upon Ser Alliser in that Braavosi tavern, would he have come? If he had dreamt of that Summer Islander girl he'd known in Pentos, with her skin like ebony and her smoldering gaze, and not the Wall and the snow and blue eyes, would he have come? Had he had that dream, but not stumbled into Haldon's room, would he have dismissed it as a nightmare?

I would be in Essos I think, dismissing stories of living dead men like all the rest, and preparing to take my throne.

"We have more than a squire and a sellsword," Duck said, smiling. "We have his father, half a maester, and a septa as well."

Ser Alliser gave him a look like stone, plainly not finding it as humorous as Duck did.

"…We also brought food and supplies for the Watch," Aegon added.

"Aye, as much as we could carry. We plan to take some along to Castle Black too." Duck gestured toward the common hall. "We were just enjoying some of the Watch's hospitality while my squire's father sees about securing horses and carts."

Ser Alliser eyed the men playing cards and the empty bowls Duck and Aegon had put aside. "…While the Watch wants for much Ser Rolly, you promised much and more in Braavos."

Aegon slid his gaze back to Duck. This was news to him, for as far as he had known, Duck had merely gotten as much information out of the knight as he could. He hadn't let slip about the Golden Company, had he? "Duck…"

Duck was at first sheepish, but then seemingly remembered himself and rounded on Aegon, "What have I told you about that name, squire? Do you want a clout in the ear?" He shook his fist threateningly.

Aegon had to suppress a smirk. Duck playing at the strict and dutiful knight was so uncharacteristic of him that he could barely pretend it was truth. Even before he had been told of his true identity, Duck had been very lax with his squire (to Jon's consternation). "My apologies, Ser," Aegon said with feigned contriteness.

Duck shook his head at him and put away his fist. Ser Alliser seemed approving of the reprimand, which made Aegon want to laugh all the more. Duck returned to his fellow knight. "My… associates are as flighty and suspicious as they are puissant, Ser. They did not take me at my word alone." Duck liked finding ways to use "nobleman words" whenever he could.

"So they should want better proof, is that it?" Ser Alliser crossed his arms, and somehow his mouth became an even firmer line than it had been before. "The Old Bear took the Watch beyond the Wall in part to uncover what he could about these monsters, but as I am certain you have heard, it has been some time since we have heard even a word from the Lord Commander. I have labored to convince Cotter Pyke to send a force north and discover what we may, but he has remained firm as a fishmonger." Ser Alliser growled. "And even if you were to seal one of these so-called wights in a barrel and ship it to your allies, I fear they might find little by the time they arrive here. If Mance Rayder brings the wildlings south, the Watch will not hold, with or without darker forces at play."

"Ship a dead man…" Duck scratched his scruffy red beard. "Could it be done, you think?"

Ser Alliser didn't respond, and Aegon had to restrain himself from swatting the back of Duck's head. Duck knew damn well what the greater point was, he just enjoyed being obtuse, and knew that his so-called squire couldn't be too obstinate if they were to keep the illusion up.

"Why not just lop off all the limbs and send each one to a different lord instead?" said Aegon. This earned him a glare from Duck, but it was an innocent enough comment for a squire to make. Anyway, that's not the point. "…But is it truly so dire on the Wall, Ser?" He made sure to use the man's proper title, men like him were nothing if not concerned with their due respect.

Rather than an answer, the knight asked a question. "Do you know the stories of the Kings-beyond-the-Wall, boy?"

Aegon frowned. He knew them vaguely, He was sure Haldon had told them to him in detail, but there was so much history to remember, that the goings-on of the North were relatively low priority to him until recently. "There were several, I believe. Every time they rose up, they were struck down by the Night's Watch or northern lords."

Ser Alliser nodded. "The man that crowned himself before Mance Rayder went by the name Raymun Redbeard, some eighty years past. The Night's Watch numbered two or three thousand then, and we still had brothers at Deep Lake and Rimegate. Raymun Redbeard snuck his army past the Watch and had to be put down by the Warden of the North and the Umbers. Now, we have less than a thousand sworn brothers." He looked to the men that played cards nearby. One yelled when he saw how outclassed his hand was. "Most are rapers and thieves and poachers; few knights or lords' sons. Near a third of our number might be dead for all that we know, including our Lord Commander and most of our fighting men. The King in the North has taken most of the North's might south, and the Ironborn that have taken their rear have never had much regard for the Wall." He paused. "So tell me, what do we do if Mance Rayder attacks?"

Stunned, Aegon looked to Duck; Duck looked back to him.

"I have no idea," Aegon said.

"Then you are ready for high command," Ser Alliser said, "For they know little more than you." There was a pregnant pause, in which none of them said a thing. Then suddenly, the grim man stood up. "If Cotter Pyke will not provide your party transport, then I will ensure you get it. I hope to meet the rest of your number at supper, Ser." The man walked out of the common hall; it was quickly darkening outside, so surely supper would be served soon.

Aegon and Duck sat in silence for a time.

What can I do? Do the dead even matter now? He thought of the Wall, the tears that fell down it in the sunlight, and the eyes he had seen beyond it. He thought of the Wall falling and his failure to fly. He remembered the Three Thousand of Qohor, and how they had faced off against fifty thousand and been victorious. But these odds are worse, he thought, and these men are not Unsullied.

Duck turned to glance at him, then frowned.

"What?" Aegon asked.

Shooting up, Duck strode over to the two men playing cards. "Hullo brothers of the Night's Watch!" He said loudly, "Would you mind if my squire and I joined in your game?"

One frowned, and the other looked suspiciously from Duck to the still sitting Aegon. Then Duck reached into his purse and threw a golden dragon to the aged and scratched table.

"Get in 'ere then!" The one with muddy brown hair and a fierce scar on his face said.

The other, an older man with hair and beard the color of straw and a nose like a beak scooted over, making room on the bench he had used.

"Squire, you heard the man!" Duck yelled, pointing to the now open seat.

Aegon shook his head, smiling, and made himself comfortable in the seat next to the older black brother. The brown haired one dealt the two of them into the game, and soon enough, it was on. By the time a sweet-smelling smoke had wafted in from the kitchen and the rest of the black brothers had begun to filter into the common hall for supper, Aegon had become "The Tyroshi brat" and was several stags in debt. He knew little and less of this particular card game, but if Duck meant for him to forget his worries for a time, he succeeded.

 

[SRWG]

Chapter VIII: The Make of a Man​

The next day, dark clouds gathered in the sky. As noon neared, Duck stood off to the side of the sparring yard with a gaggle of others, including Lemore and Haldon and a number of black brothers. He watched as Aegon and the Ironborn lad took a few practice swings at phantom opponents. His squire the king seemed a bit out of sorts clad in the padding and mail of the Night's Watch, but Ser Alliser had been adamant that if "the Tyroshi brat" were to test his mettle against his own trainees, that it should be as close to fair as was possible. Of course, Ser Alliser had quickly snorted at the thought of an Ironborn savage measuring up to another trained by a knight, Essosi or not.

But illusions of fairness must be kept up, at the very least.

Erag had a fair few inches of height over Aegon and a lot more weight, that much was plain, but the boy had clearly been a weak fighter to end up here. He and a few other ill-fated raiders had been captured up near Bear Isle (if Duck heard it true), and only he and another (Roran?) had been given the choice to take the black on account of their youth. Deciding that life on the Wall was better than no life at all, they had been sent along to Eastwatch-by-the-Sea.

Duck couldn't quite place the age of the lad, but his facial hair was far more impressive than anything Aegon could manage as yet. A sandy brown beard covered Rigon's sour aspect, though it had been even more sour before he'd been told to armor himself. They liked their fights these Ironborn, Duck could not fault them that.

Septa Lemore leaned closer to him. "He should shave," she whispered.

Haldon "hmm'd" in assent.

"I think it suits him just fine," Duck replied, smirking. "What's an Ironborn without his beard, after all?"

Lemore gave him a long silent look and then shook her head in disappointment.

But perhaps she was right. Aegon's poor beard was coming in ever stronger, and it was as silver as the Wall was godsdamned cold. It was bizarrely lenient of Jon to have let him keep it, especially here, where such features were rather uncommon. Duck felt for his king, for he too had once been a boy with a wisp of a beard that yearned to be more.

"Helmets on!" Ser Alliser called out.

Erag's surly face was soon obscured under a tarnished old great helm, and Aegon was tossed a rickety visored helm that had seen many a better year. Aegon looked at it for a moment in seeming deliberation, but then put it on as well, the blue hair that earned him his nickname here disappearing in its iron depths.

Aegon had better equipment stashed away in their chests, Duck knew, but it would have been poor sport to let him wear all that while Ser Alliser's men were granted the great honor of using hand-me-down armor. Besides, Aegon had trained in old, used armor for much of his earlier years. Jon had not commissioned him a proper set until some time after Duck had begun to train the boy.

"I have money riding on you, Squire! You'd best not disappoint me!" Duck yelled.

The helmed head of his squire turned to him almost in askance, but then shook and returned to his opponent. Duck grinned.

Haldon made a noise to his left. "It's a wonder he has not picked up your bad habits," he said.

"The gods are kind, even if you are not, Duck," Lemore said ruefully, but still smiling.

Duck spat. "I show him how not to behave is all." He made himself sound as high and mighty as he could manage. "I teach by example."

Lemore snorted a most un-septalike snort and Duck smiled. He hadn't actually bet on Aegon… or the Ironborn boy for that matter. He just liked Aegon to think that. It made him work harder.

If they wanted to think him unsavory, that was fine with Duck. He was sure he remembered hearing something about "true hearts" trumping all else from a septon at some point after all. And a little unsavoury-ness never hurt no one in any case.

When Ser Alliser called for them to commence, the cheers were few on the black brothers' end. The Ironborn were only marginally more loved here at Eastwatch than in the rest of the northern lands, and how much of that was due to its commander's own heritage Duck could not say. Still, the other Ironborn lad hauled in to the Watch gave Erag a shout of encouragement. Erag held a one handed sword and a scratched up oaken shield, while Aegon favored a bastard blade. Both weapons were blunted, from years and use as much as intent.

Erag was tall and broad, while Aegon was less tall but very lithe, even fully armored. Duck had oft heard the cliché that finesse and speed were better than strength and brawn, but Duck knew that to be the comforts whispered to the weak after a very sore beating. Nine times out of ten, the bigger man beat the brains out of the smaller one.

This was that one occasion out of ten.

Rigon was no weakling. He had clearly handled a blade more than a few times even before being sent to the Wall, and he looked to have the strength of an aurochs. But for all that every individual blow might have sent Aegon sprawling to the ground on his arse, not a one of his blows could hit home. Aegon danced around the larger boy, not even striking back for a time, seemingly gauging his opponent.

A massive overhead strike was sidestepped, a long slash across his chest ducked under, and a multitude of smaller blows batted aside almost without care. Aegon kept his relative distance. A hand and a half sword was not outrageously longer than a one handed blade, but it was always prudent to keep a smidge of distance between yourself and another with a shield.

Then, in seemingly an instant, Aegon had slipped into the other boy's guard and knocked him straight into the muddy ground. The blade was at his throat.

Still holding his sword and shield, the Ironborn boy made an unkind noise. But then, "I yield," he said, dropping his sword. Aegon offered a hand and pulled the heavier fighter to his feet.

"Shall we go again?" Aegon asked as Erag snatched his dropped blade off the muddy ground.

Erag turned back to Ser Alliser for direction, but the man was as impassive and grim looking as he usually seemed to be. Returning to Aegon, the boy nodded. "Might as well." The boy's voice was deeper than Aegon's too.

Aegon let his opponent collect himself, and then on an unspoken cue, the two of them clashed again.

Duck couldn't help but find himself jealous. He was an excellent sword, he knew, but Aegon was a natural. He was a natural at most any pursuit that he decided was worth his time, really. But the king didn't like to be reminded of it, insisting that he was as good or bad as any other man might be, but Duck knew that this was a falsehood. The blood of the dragon was old and magical, beyond the stuff that ran through a common man, and it flowed through his king's veins most strongly.

If the old saying was true, and the gods flipped a coin when a Targaryen was born, it had certainly come up in Aegon's favor.

Several bouts ensued. Aegon continued to make relatively short work of Erag, but some bouts he let last longer, parrying all manners of slashes and cuts for lengths of time before ending it quickly. Others, he went hard on the offensive, delivering rains of blows that were not quite so strong as to finish his opponent in one go, but to give the Ironborn trainee plenty of practice of his own.

Each time Erag fell, Aegon said nothing other than offering a rematch and his hand if it seemed he needed it.

After a particularly hard fall, the other boy finally shook his head when he returned to his feet. "I've 'ad enough," he said, before turning to the crowd of black brothers. "Roran, your turn!" He peeled off his great helm and tilted his head to Aegon ever so slightly.

Aegon nodded back.

Roran had looked to Ser Alliser, who barked an affirmation, then strapped on what remained of his armor as quickly as he could manage and marched into the middle of the sparring yard. Roran was of a similar build and look to Erag. Common, for sure, and perhaps a bit older. More a young man in truth than a boy. They seemed related; perhaps cousins?

As the fighting commenced, Haldon spoke up. "The Seadragon and its crew intend to tarry only shortly. They mean to leave as soon as they can restock."

Duck nodded. By the crew's words during the voyage, it had seemed likely. They bore little love for Eastwatch.

"…I ventured to the nearby village this morning," Haldon continued, "to investigate some queer talk." His cool grey eyes trailed between Duck and Lemore.

"As queer as "wights", or more?" Lemore asked. The men of the Watch had spoken freely of wights in the common hall the previous night, as they might discuss wolves in the wood, or of a very large bear. Something to worry about, yes, but something that they expected.

"More," Haldon replied. "The fisherfolk speak of white walkers."

The clashes of steel on steel faded slightly as the three of them shared a look. They had heard whispers of them as well, but there had been no confirmation of them as there had been the wights. No Other had attacked the Lord Commander in his bed.

"And?" asked Duck.

"You know as well as I that fishermen and their ilk are like to exaggerate… but I believe them." He breathed deeply. "They recount white figures stalking the northern shores. They say they wear armor like a looking glass, that shines and reflects. Whenever they steer their boats closer for a better look, the figures retreat back into the shadows of the wood."

"Could it not be wildlings?" said Septa Lemore.

Haldon shrugged. "It is possible, I suppose, but if any were to know a wildling by sight, I would think it would be men of the north."

Duck frowned. It had been closer to a year than not since he first caught sight of the rotted hand at Pynto's and heard what Ser Alliser had to say. But it was still strange to think of himself as living in a time of legends such as these. He had grown up listening to stories of such things, relished them, even. Many a night he had spent exchanging scary tales with other boys at Bitterbridge, but he had never once thought they might be true. Or rather, if they had been true at any point, then those times had long since passed.

And here was as the Wall, where he had fled from the possibility of so many years ago, chasing living dead men and Others.

"All we need now are some giants, Children of the Forest, and dragons." Duck said. "And then we'll know we're well and truly fucked."

Haldon said nothing and Lemore's handsome face contorted into a frown. "Grumkins and snarks," she said, after a time. "You mustn't forget them as well."

Roran fared somewhat better against Aegon. He was better able to use his advantage of weight against Aegon, but still, he could not prevail against the more agile, trained fighter. This one did not take Aegon's offers of aid to return to his feet as well as Erag had, but he still fought again and again.

As the two of them continued fighting, it began to snow lightly.

Duck remembered the last winter vividly, but it was still a strange sight to finally see again after so many years. It was like greeting an old enemy. There was some fondness, sure, but mostly wariness. He was lucky to have been a smith's son and apprentice, the cold had never hit him as hard as it did the poor sons of farmers out in the fields.

After one bout, Aegon raised his helm's visor and looked up into the falling snow. He reached out to the snow with his free hand.

He must barely remember the last winter, Duck thought. "Keep your godsdamned visor down!" Duck yelled.

Aegon jerked in shock but dutifully slammed his visor shut again. "I was just looking at the snow…" he grumbled.

"You won't be able to look at much of anything if you take off your helmet with an opponent just feet away!" Duck yelled again, gesturing at Roran.

Roran clearly hadn't been moving to attack though, Duck knew, but Duck had seen far too many men lose their eyes or lives in the middle of a battle. Aegon would keep his visor down and his helmet on any time a blade was near if Duck could help it.

When the two of them resumed their sparring, Duck turned back to Lemore and Haldon. "Father above," he said, "that boy will be the death of me."

"If it comes to it, then yes," Haldon replied. "That's one of the reasons Griff pays you as well as he does."

Duck crossed his arms. "I know." And it was true. He absolutely would take a knife for Aegon. My life for a king's? A duck for a dragon? It was a better deal than he had any right to get, truly.

The snow picked up as the sounds of battle gradually died with the energy of the combatants. Aegon was good, but his stamina was not endless, and on the Ironborn's end… well there was only so much of a beating a grown man could take before giving up. When Ser Alliser finally called for the fighting to end, the gathered men went their separate ways. Aegon following after Roran and Erag.

Duck saw Septa Lemore's eyes flick between the faces of the numerous dour, black-clad men as they returned to their posts. Thinking back, she had been rather attentive the night before, at supper, as well. He had just thought she was wary of the strangers, as Jon was, but…

Everyone in the party knew Duck's story, but neither he nor their king knew a thing about Lemore.

"Looking out for an old friend?" A father, maybe? Brother? A lover, even?

She clutched the seven pointed star at her chest, turning to him and transfixing him with those eyes of hers. She shook her head. "I don't think he is here," she said sadly, seeming younger than her years. "It has been so long, he may even be with the gods now."

Or maybe he had been one of the ones that went beyond the Wall.

It was after several hours of wandering Eastwatch and the lands that surround it with Aegon, talking to any and all that were willing and marveling in the snow, that Jon finally called them together in the Sea Tower. Their rooms had been furnished as well as the Watch seemed able to, and they had rested well the night before. It was delightfully warm after spending time out in the falling snow.

"Cotter Pyke has agreed to give us what we need. Transport, horses, and the men to man it all," Jon said when they had all gathered.

A grin split Aegon's face. "Good! After tarrying so long in Braavos, it bodes well that we will be moving along quickly."

"Mayhaps Lemore was right about that falling star," Duck said. "About its color and what it meant." The comet had finally dipped beyond human sight some time ago, but it was well remembered nonetheless. Here at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea they had called it "The Heavens' Slit". What that foretold, Duck was less sure of.

Jon frowned slightly. "It will be some time still until the goods can be loaded into wains, and it is likely we will not be able to take it all at once, as the Watch can spare only so much. And if this snow does not let up or grows worse, we may be forced to wait longer yet."

Aegon's grin fell some, and there was a bout of quiet. "Is there any word of the Lord Commander?" he asked.

Jon shook his head. "Still no word. Last Pyke had heard, Mormont and the ranging had camped at the Fist of the First Men, and scouts had been sent out even further."

Duck knew little and less of the lands past the Wall, so this all meant little to him. But by the sound of it, it was some distance. Hells, he thought, I know near nothing of the North, let alone what lies beyond it.

"For now, I think it best that we make use of this time," Haldon said. "Learn what we can. The lay of the land, the circumstances here, rumors, all of it. Any of it may be of use."

Jon nodded, agreeing. Lemore bowed her head slightly as well, and Aegon's grin had disappeared entirely by this point, but he too nodded.

"Time is never a waste if we use it well, right Duck?" Aegon said.

"Aye."

-

By the time the weather had let up and they had all the men and wagons they could handle, the Seadragon had left the port at Eastwatch and Duck had already more than had his fill of the area. The idea that he may have had to serve here for life was positively sickening to him, and he had never been more glad to have escaped to Essos in his youth. There had been rough times in the Golden Company, especially early on, but even those had to be better than living here in this godsforsaken place.

Aegon had continued to join Ser Alliser and his trainees, and by the end of it, even the surly knight had taken something of a liking to the boy he didn't know was his king. Or as close of a liking Ser Alliser could take to someone. Duck had dutifully followed Aegon wherever he decided to go, while taking care to always make it seem that Aegon was the one following him. Despite his nickname, most Aegon spent time conversing with took a liking to the "Tyroshi brat". His king was nothing if not gregarious.

"If other Ironborn are like Erag and Roran," Aegon said as he pulled himself onto a wiry and short grey garron, "then I should think the Ironborn's reputation is somewhat undeserved."

Duck scoffed.

"It's rather odd that an Ironborn has never served as Master of Ships, don't you think, Duck? One would think it's the natural choice to make." He gave Duck a knowing look.

"Half the realm would revolt I think," said Duck. "The Ironborn have more than earned their scorn." Growing up, Duck had heard a number of tales of Ironborn raiders making their way up the Mander. They took women as their saltwives and plundered wherever they went. He had no liking for the men of the Iron Islands. Not at all.

Aegon shrugged and made a noncommittal noise. "Perhaps there would not be so much strife if all of the kingdoms were included on the small council."

"Wherever there is power, there is strife," said Haldon to the other side of the king. He was bundled up in furs near as much as Duck himself was, and he let his hair fall rather than tie it up as he usually did. His garron was as dark as his words.

"Rather grim, don't you think?" Aegon said. "I would be more hopeful of the future, Halfmaester." He wore furs too, but they were not as thickly layered as the rest of them were. His blood always ran hot, and he rarely felt the cold as Duck did. What I wouldn't do for a bit of that dragon's blood, he thought with grim humor.

The snow had let up some days ago, but it still packed well enough on the ground that Duck could hear it crunch whenever his garron took an impatient step. If the sun decided to peek out from behind the clouds again, the road would fast become a pain to travel. They would have to wait even longer for the mud to dry, so it was decided that they might as well make the trek then. There was no better time than the present, after all.

Jon and Lemore soon wheeled around to them. Jon, ever the worrywart, had taken special care to be sure the men sent along with them were of the less blackhearted variety of sworn brother, but still, he checked their cargo and then checked it again. Lemore suspected less of these men, but tended to go with Jon on his errands anyway. Men were less likely to lie in the presence of such a godly woman. Duck knew better.

"Are we ready?" Aegon asked, his tone as bright as his chin now that he had been ordered to shave. He had kicked up a great fuss, but in the end acquiesced. Jon was not one to be trifled with on such matters. Duck had been tempted to shave as well, so that Aegon should not feel so sour about the matter, but in the end had delighted in gloating of his facial hair instead.

"As ready as we shall ever be," Lemore answered, smiling.

Duck's garron whickered as he urged it forward. He heard the wheels of the wains behind them creak in protest as they began their journey. The Wall was a hundred leagues long, they said, and they would have to traverse near half of it to get to Castle Black.

He still didn't know what exactly they would do when they arrived at Castle Black. They were only a small party, and an army of savage wildlings could already be attacking for all they were aware. But Duck still regularly thought of that day in Pynto's. He still saw that caged hand in his dreams and nightmares.

Duck would not let his king face danger without his sworn shield at his side. Aegon had been called here by the gods, Lemore thought, and he was inclined to agree. And why call him here if not for some purpose?

Slouching slightly, he turned to look at his squire and king. Aegon sat proud and tall on the back of his horse, but not as a lordling might. Not as that scoundrel Lorent Caswell had. Duck straightened up some. I might not know my purpose, but I know my duty.

 

[SRWG]

Chapter IX: Dire as a Wolf​

"He pulled out that sword

And out the blood flowed

He gripped that red sword

And down the tears poured

He swung that fiery sword

And his cries he ignored

He clenched that bright sword

And the daaaaaay was hiiiiiis rewaaaaaaard," Aegon finished, drawing out the last bits of the song, as was his wont. He let the silence sit for a moment; Lemore always said that a song was most effective if the listener had some time to reflect on its words, and he agreed most heartily. His mount continued to trudge through the snow, and he heard the creaking of carts and wheels all about him. Finally, he turned to the man he was riding alongside.

"You're good," Dareon said, tone appreciative. "Damned good, even. You said you been singing since you were a child?"

Aegon nodded.

The black brother scratched his chin, nodding as well. "Well it's clear to anyone with an ear. That's natural talent that is. But what is that song? I've heard a thousand songs, and never heard nothing about no fiery sword."

Aegon was taken aback. He looked to the other nearby black brothers with a questioning glance. There was a similar lack of recognition amongst their gazes as well. "You've never heard of Azor Ahai, truly?"

"A zor a what now? Is that the name of the sword?" Calum, an older black brother asked with half a chuckle. "Stupid name for a sword."

Aegon sputtered. "No! The sword is called Lightbringer, Azor Ahai is the man's name. He's…" he paused, struggling to come with a concise explanation. "… Everyone in Essos knows of Azor Ahai and Lightbringer, even those who don't pray to Rh'llor. He's the most esteemed hero there is on the other side of the Narrow Sea."

Dareon suddenly smacked a fist to his palm, "Ah! So a bit like the Last Hero you mean."

Thinking back to his lessons with Haldon, he vaguely recalled something about a legend of the First Men, but not enough to truly say, so it was Aegon's turn to shock the sworn brothers. He shook his head.

Calum roared and Dareon struck his side half-heartedly. "What do they teach you in those frilly Free Cities?" Calum shouted. "Not knowing the Last Hero! Bah!"

Dareon smirked, but offered up an explanation "He fought the Others, it's said, and turned back the Long Night. But I like this Azor Ahai too. Stabbing his own wife to save the world from darkness. Very dramatic!" He laughed.

Dareon was a trim and handsome youth, with flaxen hair shorn short and hazel eyes that glittered with laughter. He filled the air with songs as often as the other brothers would let him, and Aegon had approved. Calum, meanwhile, was as dark and hard as most of the other black brothers, but beneath that exterior, he was as prone to japes and jokes as any man was.

Most of the men of the Night's Watch Aegon had stricken up conversation with seemed decent enough men, truthfully. He had known better men and he had known worse men. They were men with all of their sins and all of their virtues.

The Wall glittered in the sunlight as Aegon and Dareon swapped the tales of the respective heroes. The brothers liked to say that the Wall "wept" on warm days, and it was a good description in his opinion. Despite the snows that had marked the beginning of the journey, the weather had been remarkably sunny and warm (or as warm as it got at the Wall) since. The Wall had been dripping glittery blue tears near every day.

Their path from Eastwatch to Castle Black had never wound far from the Wall itself. Conditions forced them to take somewhat less direct paths at times, but the Wall was so massive that it was always in view. It was such a constant that Aegon eventually began to forget it was even there. He'd spend some time riding and singing or trading stories, then turn, and realize once again that the Wall was there; it was there and absolutely tremendous. It was like living with a bear or some other great beast, as many wealthy magisters did. After a while, you forgot that it was strange in the first place, until you gave it some thought and remembered that a man-killing beast was sleeping on your expensive rug.

As it turned out, there were more than a few similarities in the stories of the Last Hero and Azor Ahai. Both featured swords in some capacity, though the Last Hero's was broken in two, and Lightbringer was aflame.

"Personally, I'd chance it with the fiery sword," Calum had said, chortling.

The circumstances of the great darkness were somewhat different (and much more detailed in Dareon's telling of the Last Hero), but they both featured prominently. Rh'llor himself featured in the story of Azor Ahai, but no god or gods made themselves known to the Last Hero or his companions. All told, it was a grim tale.

Aegon had spent a bit of time teaching Dareon the words of Azor Ahai's song, but had mostly wiled the day away talking of this strange Essosi tradition, or that odd personage from the Free Cities, and listening to Calum and Dareon's tales of Westeros in turn. The sky was beginning to darken when they finally caught sight of Castle Black.

Like Eastwatch before it, Castle Black was something of a horror. No walls protected it, but Aegon knew the stories as to why this was the case. It was ramshackle, even from a distance. A handful of towers rose from its sorry collection of old stone keeps and halls. One tower reached near a third of the way up the Wall but was in visible disrepair. If this was the state of the headquarters of the Night's Watch, then Ser Alliser's grim outlook seemed more reasonable than ever.

Dareon took a deep breath, inhaling the chilly air with apparent relish. "Ah, Castle Black," he said. "Feels like I'm coming home. Assuming that it's home if I hated every minute I spent there o' course."

"So just like home then, eh?" Calum said with a snort.

Aegon smirked despite himself.

By the time they were nearly upon what passed for a gate to the castle itself, Aegon had pulled to the front of the line of carts. Jon and Lemore had spent much of the journey at the fore, while he and Duck had ventured up and down the line freely. Duck met them there shortly. Jon's face betrayed a worry not unlike Ser Alliser's, and Aegon saw a similar emotion in Lemore's face as well.

He knew what Jon was thinking. 'This is a fool's errand,' I'd wager. But a king had to be foolish at times. They had to be everything a common man was and more, and if that meant he must needs take risks, then so be it. The Night's Watch was in a pitiable state, that was certain, but there was a reason his dreams had called him here.

"They appear understaffed," Jon said, his tone flat.

And it was true, there were few men in the yards. Braziers burned here and there; most of the visible movement in the castle seemingly came from the smoke wafting up from the fires.

"It only stands to reason," Lemore replied. "Half their men went out on that ranging, or so they told it."

"Aye, but to see it as it is," said Jon, shaking his head, "I never would have thought this possible."

The Night's Watch had been an afterthought in his learning. He had learned much and more of the history of the Seven Kingdoms. He had learned of these kings and those kings. The Kings of the Rock, the Gardener Kings, even a handful of the Kings in the North to some extent. He had learned much and more of the Blackfyres and their six rebellions, and which lords and lands had been more likely to stand for one side of the other. He had learned much about the Dornish and their wars against the rest of the Seven Kingdoms, as well as Daeron I's final incorporation of Dorne into the realm, and the aforementioned Blackfyre Rebellions that followed. He had learned of Blacks and Greens, and the horrors that dragons wrought on man and dragon alike, as the Targaryen dynasty tore itself to shreds in the brutal Dance.

Haldon, Lemore, and Jon had taught him so much of the realm that was his. It had filled his years easily, and he knew there was yet more that could fill it long into his future. But what he had belatedly realized was that precious little had been taught about the Night's Watch. Everyone knew of the Wall, and everyone knew that wildlings lurked beyond it. Giants had lumbered about in the lands north of the Wall once, though they were long dead. The Night's Watch did little, if their exclusion from most of his lessons was a commentary on their importance. Every so often, there was a King-Beyond-the-Wall, and every so often the Watch aided in putting them down.

Otherwise, he only ever heard them mentioned when a rogue knight or lord was not simply killed for his treasons. Those lucky ones would be sent to the Wall, and most oft, there their stories ended.

But beyond those skilled, if traitorous, few, what went to the wall was thieves, poachers, rapers, smugglers, and whatever else.

"How often did you hear of men going to the Wall voluntarily, father?" Aegon asked, his meaning clear.

"Without threat of death or mutilation?" Jon asked, to which Aegon nodded. Their horses took tired steps toward Castle Black. "Rarely. Most knights and lords would rather have served the rest of their days as a master at arms, steward or some such."

"Did anyone in your family ever serve on the Wall?" He asked.

"No. Not in my lifetime at least, and probably my father's as well," answered Jon.

Aegon frowned. "Then if knights and lords are the best of us, how could the Watch do anything but decline if none will go?"

Jon hadn't gone to the Wall. He'd been exiled when he had failed to eliminate the Usurper. He would have been allowed to join the Watch had he demanded it, but he had chosen to go to Essos. Jon was a mighty knight and an able commander; he would have served the Watch well, but he had not gone. Aegon glanced sidelong to Duck.

"Don't be sore," Duck jeered, though there was a decided lack of venom. "I didn't go either, Griff." Duck had risked his life escaping the Reach and fleeing to a foreign land. He hadn't had the security of a former king's Hand or a lord. He hadn't been formally exiled. Near every man had the option of joining the Watch when they committed a crime, but he too had chosen exile. And he certainly hadn't been among the best of men then.

If Aegon wasn't who he was, would he go the Wall? Would he raise his sons and see his daughters wed, tend to his family and have it flourishing if he could help it, and then, when he should have the time to enjoy the fruits of his labors, instead spend the rest of his days here in this cold? Would he have done that?

Eastwatch had not been hellish, and Castle Black did not truly look it either, but the conditions were undoubtedly poor. And he had seen and talked to men who had spent years here. He witnessed and felt what the Wall did to men.

But even after all these considerations, if he, in his twilight years, went to join the Watch, how much of a boon was an old knight or lord, truly? Disquieted, Aegon fell in alongside the man who had been his father. It was hard to blame him for choosing Essos.

A lone black rider met them as they passed onto the grounds of Castle Black. The black brothers among them must have been plain enough to the men stationed within to signal that they weren't a band of brigands or raiders. Still, he was glad they at least sent a man out to make sure. He was a small man, with common brown hair and great big ears. He looked about Aegon's own age, though he might have been north or south of it with the boyishness of his countenance.

"Who goes there?" the man asked, back straight in an attempt at appearing imposing.

By then, Calum had made his way to the front of the column as well, being something of a senior brother among the batch that had been sent with them from Eastwatch. "Come off it boy, it's plain that they're with us," the older man growled.

"Aye, shove off Pyp," Dareon called from further back.

'Pyp's' eyes flicked back and forth from Calum to Dareon and all between, clearly nonplussed. "You know how the Ol' Pomegranate is, he likes to know the goings-on!" He said, mastering his tone.

"Old Pomegranate?" Calum asked. "I haven't been back here in years, how should I know how some man likes it?"

"The Lord Steward I mean; the Lord Commander made him castellan before he left. And he's been right edgy since–"

Jon finally cut in, his voice easily projecting authority, "We are friends to the Watch. The Lord Steward has nothing to fear; we come bearing goods and seeking news."

The man called Pyp appeared quizzical, "News? Well we got plenty of that."

"Really, what?" Aegon asked, unable to contain his curiosity. It earned him a somewhat reprimanding stare from Jon.

"Well, I s'pose plenty is the wrong word," Pyp said, unbothered by his interjection. "But we have news, and I'm afraid it isn't good. The great ranging has been attacked."

-

It was no time at all before they were brought before the Lord Steward himself, a man named Bowen Marsh. Having partaken in a pomegranate or three in his time, Aegon found that it was an apt moniker for the castellan of Castle Black. Round, red, and flustered, the man appeared about ready to burst, though Aegon wasn't especially keen to discover what juices would spill out.

They had been ushered through a large oaken door, studded with bolts that showed clear signs of age. Pyp (Pypar, in truth, he had told them) himself had brought them up the winding tower's stairway and into the warm solar. Rolls of parchment and countless bottles of ink seemed to cover every surface of the room, as if it were a bizarrely academic moss on an old rock. There was some order to it, but Aegon could not decipher it.

Bowen Marsh sat behind a large writing desk, his face near as red as the fire that roared in the hearth.

"Thank you Pyp," the man said. "Return to your duties."

The younger steward made a face, but duly acquiesced and quickly shuffled out of the room.

The Lord Steward cast aside a parchment and stood up from his desk. He gestured to the number of chairs that had been set out. "Please, sit," he said. It was not an unkind voice, but there was some steel beneath the pleasant hum.

Haldon sat near Lemore, while Jon took the seat closest to Bowen Marsh. Duck sat in the furthest seat, and Aegon took the one next to him. It was only appropriate that a knight's squire sat beside him, after all. As the foremost of their party, Jon offered introductions.

"I am Griff," he said. "And the boy is my son." Aegon bristled a bit. He had been a man grown for well over a year now… "His instructors: Haldon." A nod. "And Septa Lemore." A smile and a brandishing of her pendant (as if her habit wasn't enough). "And Ser Rolly Duckfield, who is teaching my son in the ways of knighthood." Aegon laughed internally, though Duck played the part well at the moment.


The Lord Steward looked from one to the next, taking in each of them. "Cotter Pyke had word sent ahead of your coming," he said, once Jon was done. "And as the Lord Steward, I would personally thank you for your contributions to the Night's Watch. I know better than near any man how direly the Watch lacks for supplies." Bowen Marsh inclined his head to Jon, and then his eyes scanned over each of the rest of their party. He lingered on Lemore. "It is not often we have women on the Wall, as I am sure you noticed at Eastwatch."

Marsh let it linger, but they all caught the underlying message. Lemore would have one of them nearby during their stay here, that much was certain. While Aegon didn't think the sworn brothers likely to assault her, Jon thought differently. He was always wary, but Aegon supposed that was what had gotten him through the turbulent years of Aerys' reign.

"Might I ask of the news of the ranging?" Jon asked. "Your men made mention of it, but I would hear it from a high officer. Tales have a way of growing in the telling."

Aegon saw the red of the Lord Steward's face pale to a dull pink and the firm line of his mouth fall slightly. "We received the ravens soon after you left from Eastwatch I'd gather. The men had been camped at the Fist of the First Men, far to the north, for some time. There had been some word of further expeditions with smaller parties, but we had not heard anything definitive as to the wildlings' intent... Then a raven arrived with news of an attack upon the Fist."

They had heard all of this in one way or another (Pyp was talkative), but it was still something of a shock. Haldon leaned forward. "Were the wildlings making their move?"

"We know little and less of who led the attack… or how many now lie dead for that matter," Marsh replied grimly. "Maester Aemon believes that the message was written long before the attack, so that in the event of an engagement, ravens might be dispatched at once. As such, the letter is vague."

The mention of his distant relative nearly made him jump. He's alive, he thought, I will meet another Targaryen then. He knew he would one day meet his Dornish family, but after the disappearance of Daenerys, Aegon had thought he might never meet a living Targaryen until he had his own children.

"And there were no further messages?" Jon asked, jogging Aegon from his thoughts.

Marsh began to shake his head, but stopped suddenly. "It could be said that we received more messages…" He chuckled darkly, with no trace of real humor. "The ravens came to us in force only a short time after the first raven had arrived. But the messages they bore were blank. Naught a word on any of those godsdamned birds. We have received nothing else."

The great bulk of the Watch's fighting men might already be dead or dying then. This… this was somehow worse than he'd been expecting. Alliser had impressed upon Duck the Night's Watch's need, he knew, but in that village on the Bay of Lorath, even with bright blue eyes boring into his brain, he had not thought it could be as bad as it had turned out to be.

As a squire, he knew most here in the Seven Kingdoms would look less kindly on him speaking out of turn. He could play roles, for he'd played them all his life, intentionally or not. I came here for a reason. Aegon spoke up. "So, it could be the Others, then? And not the wildlings?"

The Others were used frequently as a curse word by men and women from Westeros. He'd seen the way men of Essos would stare unknowingly at their mention, but even among Westerosi, it was something of a lesser curse, at least in his experience. But here and now, with the men of the Watch, the word was almost never heard. Here it wasn't just a curse anymore, here it was a reality. And men seemed to fear that speaking their name might turn the Others' blue eyes to the one whose lips the word had escaped. Aegon's question hung in the air like a miasma.

Finally, the Lord Steward stood, almost laboriously. His brown eyes bored into Aegon's own. "Aye. It could be."

Aegon traded glances with everyone else in the room. Haldon was calculating, Duck nervous, Lemore worried, and Jon… Jon he couldn't define. There was a bit of everything in his sharp blue eyes. But Aegon could see the man he'd grown up idolizing. He could see the mighty warrior and the loving father. He could see determination.

"Did you see them, Lord Marsh?" Jon asked. "The Others?"

"Others? No." The Lord Steward took lumbering steps out from behind the desk, stray parchments fell as he squeezed his way past. "But I saw the wights," he said as he neared the fire. "Or what remained of them, at least. I had known the men they'd been before, too. Othor and Jafer. Good men they'd been, and able rangers. Jafer killed five men before he was brought down and burned. Othor would have killed the Lord Commander if it weren't for Snow and his wolf."

Wolf?

"Othor…" Duck said, trailing off. "I saw his hand in Braavos. It still moved. It clawed and scraped and twitched all about in that cage." He shivered. "It gave me nightmares that did."

"And half the men of Castle Black as well," Marsh replied. "I'm sure you heard from Ser Alliser himself about his sojourn to Kings Landing. Aid from the capital is more sorely needed now than ever before." He spat into the fire. "Five kings, and not a one lifted a finger for the Watch."

One did, Aegon thought.

"This is the matter that has drawn us here, in truth," Jon said.

"The five kings?" Marsh asked.

Aegon caught Duck's quick smirk, but Jon managed to keep his face straight. "No. Aid for the Watch."

The Lord Steward turned away from the fire, meeting Jon's gaze and arching an eyebrow. "Beyond what you have already brought then, you mean?"

"While the Night's Watch lacks for much, by both Cotter Pyke's measure and my own observations, what it lacks for most is bodies," said Jon. "Is that a fair estimation?"

"The greatest defenses in the world mean little if there are no men to man them," Marsh answered. "Aye. Our foodstocks are low, and much of our steel is of poor quality, and more men would only compound these issues, but still, we need the men. Even if every man of the ranging returned alive, we would still need for able bodied defenders."

"… What if I told you that ten thousand skilled swords could be brought here?"

Marsh stood straighter, his eyes wide. "I would ask who? What army, and why?"

Jon's eyes flicked over to Aegon's. Aegon smiled.

"Because this is the war that matters." He saw Haldon, Lemore, and Duck all glance his way, nodding. "If the Wall falls, it will not matter who sits the Iron Throne. And as to who and what army?" Jon took a deep breath. "I speak of the Golden Company."

Bowen Marsh stared. Shock, then comprehension, then confusion all washing across his red face in quick succession. "You said your name was Griff? Who are you, really, Griff?" His eyes seemed to take in Jon anew.

"I am a retired sellsword, and nothing else," Jon said with practiced ease. "…But I have very powerful and influential allies. Allies that would see the realms of men guarded, rather than overtaken by monsters and savages."

Marsh fumbled his way back to his writing desk, his gait somehow even more ungainly than it had been before. When he sat, he took several deep breaths and went about reshuffling some of his parchments, as well as picking up the ones that had dropped to the floor. Suddenly, he jerked. "They would need proof, surely? Else you would not speak in hypothetical."

At that, Jon grimaced. "We had hoped to find that proof might be readily at hand when we made it here. We had heard of the great ranging even in Braavos, but now…" He trailed off.

The Halfmaester took the silence as on opportunity for input. "I admit, I had been skeptical at first," Haldon said. "But I see the fear in which your men have spoken of these wights. The villagers near Eastwatch… they spoke of Others. And they did not lie. These are not the drunken sailors' stories or children's tales. …Perhaps if we saw them ourselves, or better still, if we could get ahold of one of these wights, or even a part of one…" Haldon said, "Surely, it would persuade even the most skeptical of men."

"And the men who wield the greatest influence, veer the most toward skeptical, as your Ser Alliser discovered," Lemore said.

"You mean to range beyond the Wall yourselves?" Marsh shook his head vigorously. "No. Most definitely not. The wildlings might be anywhere in these woods, and even veteran rangers perish routinely north of the Wall. No."

"But–" Aegon started.

Marsh rounded on him, "No. Not until the ranging, or whatever is left of it, has returned, at the earliest. You would not survive without seasoned rangers at your side. Your chances are better if you wait. And I would not have this chance slip through my fingers."

Aegon clenched his teeth. He looked over to the rest of his party. By their unshaken reactions, they seemed to have expected this. If the Father was just, Aegon would never become so jaded.

"In the meantime, I would have you stay here in the King's Tower, as it is fitting for honored guests. There are rooms that have scarce been used in years that I will have made ready."

Jon stood, gesturing for the rest of them to follow. "Thank you, Lord Steward, for your hospitality. With good fortune, the ranging will return soon, and the Golden Company will be fetched while there is time."

Bowen Marsh bowed slightly. "Make yourselves comfortable where you can, I will send for you when your rooms are prepared."

When they left the Lord Steward's solar, Aegon noticed that Lemore had stayed behind. He looked to Jon in askance.

"She has another matter to discuss with the Lord Steward, she will be along shortly." He said, always quick to ward off Aegon's questions.

-

Later, Aegon managed to peel off Duck for a time, and found Dareon next to a brazier in the primary courtyard, Pyp at his side. Warming their hands at the fire, they seemed surprisingly somber. From what he'd seen of Pyp, he'd seemed amiable enough, and Dareon was ever a conversationalist.

"What's got you so quiet?" Aegon asked as he sidled up.

Pyp looked over, and something flashed over his face. "What's your name again?" he asked.

"Griff," Dareon supplied. "Though everyone calls him Young Griff, on account 'o his father bearing the same name."

"Y'know Young Griff, you look a bit familiar to me," said Pyp.

Aegon froze. Surely Maester Aemon was far too old for there to be any obvious resemblance? Surely! Was there someon–

"Yeah, I know who it is," Pyp continued, "you remind me of Satin." He chuckled.

Aegon breathed more easily. It was just some joke he wasn't party to.

Dareon's face scrunched up. "Who's Satin?"

Pyp rounded on Dareon. "You don't know Satin? W–Oh… Right. He got here after you left. He's the pretty one, with the curly hair. You'll see him around before you leave."

Aegon turned his hands against the fire. It was delightfully warm in the now chillier air. He wasn't looking forward to being here when winter truly arrived… Hopefully by then, they'd have taken care of everything here.

"But to answer your question. We were talking about the ranging."

"Several of our brothers were on that ranging," Dareon added.

"Aren't they all your brothers? Sworn brothers of the Night's Watch?" Aegon asked.

Pyp gave him a hard look. "They're all our brothers, o' course. But some of them were our brothers. Lord Snow and the Aurochs and Ser Piggy."

"We were trainees together," said Dareon. "So if any o' them died on that ranging, I'd think it'd be them. Green boys always go first."

Oh. "Wherever they are, I hope they return," He said in commiseration. It was the best he could do. "…This Lord Snow, is he the one with the wolf, who slew the wight?"

Pyp smiled. "That's him. He's not a real lord. We just call him that because his father was Lord Stark."

"Before they cut off his head." Dareon shook his still attached head.

That Aegon had a harder time sharing in their reverence for. Lord Stark was one of the men who had helped bring about his own family's downfall, however terrible a king his grandfather had been. "So, he's a bastard then?"

The two brothers nodded.

"Like half the Watch," Pyp snickered, "We got Stones and Flowers and Pykes and Snows. Can get 'em ten a penny here at the Wall." He sobered quickly. "Lord Snow was the best of our bunch though, except in singing." Dareon bobbed knowingly. "and he's got a great big dire wolf at his side. Silent as a spirit with red eyes. A good dog that Ghost is."

Aegon supposed it wasn't much different than an average magister with an exotic pet. Many even had whole menageries, really. But here, it definitely felt strange for there to be a man with a wolf. Especially a Stark by blood if not name.

"What is a dire wolf, exactly? I've never seen one." He knew of them. Heraldic symbols of the houses great and small were drilled into him by Haldon, Jon, and even Lemore.

"Most haven't, don't feel bad about it," Pyp said, smirking. "They're just overlarge wolves, if I'm honest. As if wolves weren't big enough as is. Fiendish smart too. Jon could near have conversations with that wolf."

"Jon Snow's his name, then?"

"Uh-huh. And Ser Piggy is Samwell Tarly, and the Aurochs is Grenn."

"I hope I get to meet them all," Aegon said, truthfully. Dareon and Pyp seemed good men. Any friends of theirs could just as easily be friends of his. Even Stark's son.

Without warning, Dareon jolted. "Hey, Griff, tell Pyp that mad story." At Aegon's questioning look, he continued, "The one with the sword, the Lightbringer and all that!"

And so Aegon spent his hours. He knew that Pyp and Dareon were most likely dodging some duty or another. But the Night's Watch was their lifelong duty. They'd have years upon years to fetch this or that, and tend to that crumbling building or leaking wall. If he could be their excuse to have a reprieve for a night, he was happy to provide it. It was the least he could do.

If he could help it, he'd do much more for them. He'd make sure they'd have those years and years to tend to this, or fetch that.

 

[SRWG]

Chapter X: The Chained Dragon​

Time passed slowly at Castle Black. Life had been slow going at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea, but that was before there had been any definitive news of the Lord Commander's ranging. Now, energy and hope seemed to have drained right out of the black brothers. Not a soul knew when, or even if Mance Rayder and his wildling host would be coming for the few men of the Night's Watch that remained.

But most thought he was coming, the arguments and mutterings concerned mostly from when, where, and how the attack would be coming. Some said he'd build skiffs and bring his men across the Bay of Seals and take Eastwatch. Eastwatch had ships, a fair number even, but not enough to handle the sheer number of wildlings in Rayder's host, assuming the stories were true. He could make for the Shadow Tower instead, and some insisted this would be the smartest course of action for the man, as he was originally a brother of the Shadow Tower and would surely know the land well. Yet others believed he would simply dig through one of the collapsed tunnels and gates of the abandoned castles, and they would soon find themselves taken from the wrong side of the Wall.

Whatever the stratagem posited, the mood was unanimously low and the outlook worse. Aegon admired Pyp more than ever for his japes amidst such a storm of hopelessness.

Aegon spent the slowly lessening daylight hours in the practice yard for the most part. The men that had been left behind were mostly from among the ranks of the stewards and builders, as the great majority of rangers had gone beyond the Wall; of those remaining, many were too old or simply unfit for battle. Ser Endrew Tarth seemed to appreciate his enthusiasm at least, and welcomed his and Duck's presence. The recruits looked less kindly upon his skill at arms, but "It's better that we bash you up a bit than a screaming wildling does it," Duck had said, "and mayhaps this bashing means you'll survive the next one."

He found himself practicing his archery very frequently as well, but realistically, there wasn't too much use in improving one's accuracy. Aim would matter little if they ended up loosing from the top of the Wall. Seven hundred feet of air and wind would impair even the surest of shots.

Lemore had spent much of her time caring for the frankly dilapidated sept. The septon here at Castle Black was half drunk at the best of times, and falling over drunk the rest of them. Lemore had let her displeasure be known to Bowen Marsh (for lack of a higher authority), but had decided it would be better to lead by example. The sept now looked considerably better than it had in years (if Spare Boot was to be believed), and attendance to organized prayer had seen a noticeable jump. Aegon was reasonably certain this had more to do with Lemore than it did any newfound faith.

Jon was most often keeping near Lemore (Haldon relieving him most times when he went elsewhere) during her cleaning and repair of the sept; he still thought little of the black brothers, and trusted their vows of celibacy even less. He was often called away by the Lord Steward, but otherwise made himself scarce. Occasionally he would watch Duck and Aegon in the training yard, and a few times even fought, other times Aegon had seen him leave the armory. Aegon knew Jon was not comfortable here, and chafed in the waiting.

Haldon had quickly made himself a second home with Maester Aemon and his assistant (Clydas? Clyden?) in the libraries. There were few men at Castle Black who could read, and fewer still who could reliably write, so the presence of another skilled eye and hand was a boon if Haldon told it true. Aegon could only trust Haldon's word, because he had as yet not visited the aged maester.

Because now that he was here, and actual living, breathing family was only a short walk away, he found himself paralyzed. When he was young, and Jon's tales had been his reality, he knew that Jon was the only family he'd had left. It had all changed when he was told the truth, but in some ways, it was almost more torturous. His family had been massacred, and most of what was left was out of reach.

Now, it was within reach, but he couldn't bring himself to reach out his hand and grab it tight.

"If the Lord Commander does not return," Jon had said, "and they will not take us beyond the Wall, then we will go to the Shadow Tower, and try Mallister instead. We cannot sit by idly forever."

Haldon had furrowed his brow. "The Watch is depleted," he'd said, "It would be unreasonable to expect them to take us north to find an enemy that they do not even know the location of. I fear we would get much the same answer from the Shadow Tower."

Aegon grit his teeth, gripping the wool of his coat forcefully. "We did not come here for nothing; we have a purpose to serve. The ranging will return, I know it."

But he did not know it. It was hope as much as it was belief.

He'd never been a fanciful child, he'd never had delusions of some grand destiny. He would be a sellsword, probably a knight too, and win fame and fortune like his father. Then later he discovered that he was to be a king; one that was good and fair and would right the wrongs of his grandfather and the usurpers alike. Never had it been because of prophecy, but because of duty. That had all changed. Now here he was, halfway across the world because of a nightmare and a half-rotted hand with a life of its own.

"But we should be prepared in the event that they do not," said Jon. "If the wildlings come in force, as the Lord Steward believes, then we will be as sheep to the slaughter. We are not tied to the Wall, as the Night's Watch is. If it's between dying with them, or escaping with our lives, we will escape."

Aegon hated it, but he knew that Jon was right. Dying here would help no one, least of all himself.

"If we must leave with our tails between our legs, then we will go to Strickland," Aegon said. "I will convince him myself. No matter what happens here, I know the face of our enemy. I will make them see it too." Breathing deeply, Aegon took a leap of faith. "I mean to tell Aemon."

Jon's blue eyes narrowed. "Tell him what?" His voice was flat. Jon knew damn well what he meant.

"About me. Who I am and why I am here."

Haldon smirked, shooting a sideways glance to Jon. "I knew he would. Duck and Lemore too."

Crossing his arms, Jon sat back in his chair. He took a long slow breath through his nostrils, his lips pressed into a thin, grim line. He uncrossed his arms and opened his mouth, then slammed it shut and crossed his arms again.

"If we cannot secure escort through and beyond the Wall, and we do have to leave without proof of the threat, then by the time I return here, he might be dead. The wildlings will kill every sworn brother they can if they take the castle by strength of arms, and even if the Watch manages to hold them off, his age might well be the end of him." He turned to Haldon. "Have you heard any mention of my aunt?"

"None," Haldon said, shaking his head. "Not here, at Eastwatch, or among the fisherfolk. Aemon and Clydas certainly haven't heard anything."

"Then this might very well be my only chance to talk to one of mine own." Aegon clenched his fist. "And he's the only Targaryen left who remembers the Targaryens in all their splendor. My aunt remembers less than even I."

Jon looked him deep in the eye, his dark blue against his own deep purple. Finally, he nodded. "Very well. Do as you will, son, you're a man grown." He smiled. "I cannot shield you forever, or you shall end up as the bastard on the Iron Throne." Jon looked to Haldon. "Does he seem a trustworthy sort?"

"Maester Aemon? Aye. He has been nothing but accommodating to my inquiries, and the men here love him as a grandfather besides." He stood, adjusting the thick furs he'd taken to wearing in the north. "If Marsh was worthy of knowing of our link to the Golden Company, then Aemon is worthy of this. Of that I am certain."

And with that, Aegon had finally had no excuse. Jon's presumed disapproval had been his final hurdle, so with his blessing, he could no longer pin the blame on another. Every day he waited was another day he risked the old man taking ill and becoming delirious, but every day Aegon found himself in the practice yard beating on recruits instead.

Arron and Emrick, two brothers from way out in Fair Isle, were fair enough fighters, but poor Hop-Robin was a truly sorry warrior. His clubfoot was little but a hindrance when it came to his footwork, and he was surely destined for stewardhood. A ranger he was not. Only Satin showed true ferocity, though he had a decided lack of practice. Which was to be expected from a boy of his background.

He shared his story readily enough when Aegon proved himself companionable, but it wouldn't have mattered. His past was well known among the black brothers (and so circulated easily at supper when wine flowed), and was the subject of much scorn and derision. He'd been a prostitute in Oldtown. Born in a pleasure house, he'd grown surrounded by whores and had grown to become one himself.

While this changed Aegon's measure of the lad some, he was not as instinctually revulsed as the Westerosi men here tended to be. Male whores were not accepted exactly in the Free Cities (for the most part), but they were known. What a man partook in was his concern, and most did not dig deeply into others' habits and tastes. Satin proved to be likeable, and his desire to improve was admirable. Aegon had no quarrel with him.

And when a man took the black, their pasts were meant to be forgotten, or at least forgiven. Men here have done worse than lay with another man.

Pyp's jest at least was not exactly an offense to Aegon. Satin was a well-made youth, with handsome features. They were of an age (roughly), but Aegon's build was taller and stronger. A similarity to Satin was not something he would frown upon. Aegon knew that had he not had Jon frowning down on him every time a pretty girl had looked his way, he would have spent his years in Essos traveling from one woman's arms to another's.

But even Jon's disapproving glares and stern lectures on propriety had not kept him maiden. Oh, Rajja.

Finally, after days of stalling and countless defeats of the Night's Watch recruits (and on Duck as well), Aegon could no longer argue with himself. He bid Duck and the recruits good afternoon, and marched to the stout wood and stone keep that housed the maester, his assistant, and the host of ravens they tended to.

The past days had been sunny enough, so the ground was hard beneath his feet rather than the soft slush of recently melted snow it had been when they had first arrived. Black brothers milled about, seeing to their daily chores. A few rolled barrels from the storerooms and toward the common hall. Owen the Oaf, tall and blond and friendly as he was dimwitted, was hauling a large crate from the armory, from where Aegon could hear the one-armed smith Donal Noye hard at work.

Aegon prided himself on his ability to quickly remember faces and names. Jon and Lemore had pounded the skill into him from a very young age, though the purpose had not been clear until he discovered his identity. A king must know more men than he can count.

When the men weren't at their tasks, they tended to gather around the brazier's that dotted the grounds of Castle Black. Warmth was always a pleasure this far north, and those shared warmings of hands were where Aegon had heard many a story. There, and in the common hall whenever food was served.

Finding the door to the Maester's quarters, Aegon gave it a firm knock. He heard quiet shuffling from behind the door, and upon it creaking open, saw the aged form of Maester Aemon's assistant. He knew it to be him, because he had seen him fetch meals from the common hall and he knew that Aemon seldom left his own rooms. Clydas was an old man, hunched, short, and decidedly round. he stared forcefully with pinkish eyes that were clearly ill accustomed to brightness; Haldon had said he was half blind, and Aegon believed it.

Clydas's dim pink eyes probed searchingly at his face. "I do not know you. Are you one of the recruits?" His voice was faint.

"Ah, no," Aegon replied. "I'm Griff, the younger one. Of Haldon's party?" He hoped the man's memory was better than his eyes.

Recognition flared, and the man smiled. He was an ugly old man, so it distorted his features almost grotesquely. "Yes, yes. Haldon has made mention of you, please come in." Clydas stepped aside and pulled the door open wider to allow easier entrance.

Entering the room, Aegon felt a wave of warmth. Nearly every building at Castle Black was kept quite warm by diligent stewards and countless burning hearths, but this one was almost stuffy to Aegon. He loosened the outer layer of his thick wool garments.

"Haldon has been a great boon," Clydas said as he closed the door. "Since Samwell left on the ranging, reading letters and books to Maester Aemon has been my duty." The man coughed a wet laugh. "I can tend to the ravens, and help Maester Aemon around Castle Black, but my eyes have long since passed their prime, Young Griff."

"He told me that he has been helping to preserve some of the decaying texts," Aegon said, a frown curling his lips, "but I didn't know that he was reading your letters as well." Aegon trusted Haldon, but the fact that the Night's Watch would so trust an outsider was somewhat alarming.

Clydas studied him, evaluating, "The Night's Watch is a servant of the realm as a whole. And that aside, we get little nowadays that could not be freely told to even the lowest black brother." He gestured for Aegon to follow. "The Night's Watch has fewer learned men than it ever has, and those few we get, tend to be better used as rangers."

Following behind the older man's surprisingly quick shuffle, Aegon took off his most outer coat. The cold had bothered him least of any in their party, so it was actually rather too warm here.

"The gods are with you," Clydas said, "Maester Aemon often takes short rests this time of day, but he is currently awake." He stopped before a secondary inner door. This one was in better condition than the outer door. "These are his personal quarters," Clydas continued. "If you require any assistance with him, I will be above," he pointed up to the ceiling, "tending to the ravens. Do try not to rile him too much, he is old, and the Watch cannot afford to lose him."

Aegon nodded, but felt a pang of guilt. If there was something that would rile him, a relative thought long lost might be it.

The stooping steward knocked lightly on the door and slid it open. "Maester Aemon, you have a visitor," he called.

Aegon could barely make out the faint "Send him in," that was the reply. Clydas gave him one last long look, and waived him ahead.

Maester Aemon's room was somehow even warmer than the rest of the building, making Aegon glad that he had removed some of his clothing. Dragon Aemon may be, but age had plainly dulled the fire in his blood. The aged maester sat in a chair close to the fire, facing it head on. Another chair sat near Aemon's.

"Come, sit," Maester Aemon said. His voice was even frailer than Clydas's.

Aegon took a hesitant first step. He realized suddenly that his heart was pounding in his chest. He couldn't even see the old man's face, and he was feeling… what? Anxious? Afraid? Excited? Aemon looked so small in the padded wooden chair, almost like a child. A king afraid of a little old man? If only Duck could see him now.

Half to steady himself and half to perhaps shock his body into sensibility, Aegon struck himself in the chest with a clenched fist. He breathed deeply, each breath less ragged than the last. Calm down, he thought. Then he crossed the room in a rush and took a seat.

He looked to the last living male Targaryen other than himself, and indeed, maybe the last other Targaryen entirely. What Aegon saw was a shrunken and shriveled old man. Not a hair remained on his head, not a single eyebrow or whisker on his face. The skin appeared stretched thinly across his round head, so that every vein, and even his skull itself was readily apparent. His eyes were clouded and milk white. A long and thick chain was draped around his neck, sagging low into his lap; a hundred metals decorated each link of the chain, and shined this color or that in the flashing of the fire.

For all that his age was almost terrifying, that he was nearly a specter, Maester Aemon looked kind. Laugh lines many times older than Aegon himself extended around his mouth, and his eyes, unseeing as they were, bore not an ounce of malice. Aemon's blind eyes followed him, even as they could not pin him down. "Who do I have the pleasure of entertaining this afternoon?" Aemon asked softly.

Aegon squirmed in his hard seat. This one wasn't padded like the other and was distinctly uncomfortable. "I–Well, that's why I'm here," he said finally.

The ancient maester hummed. "Are you one of Haldon's number?" Aegon started, but before he could respond, the old man continued, "Your accent. I hear tinges of the Free Cities… Pentos, in particular, I believe." He laughed. "You mask it well."

His earliest years had been spent in Pentos, in the care of first Illyrio's servants and then Lemore, before Jon had finally entered his life. While he had been raised on the Common tongue, those early years had colored him, and his continued exposure to the accents and varieties of language throughout Essos had engendered in him an appreciation of language that extended beyond strict, formally spoken common. Still, Jon, and then later Haldon, had made sure that few could pick out the remnants of the East in his voice.

He realized that he hadn't responded, and that Aemon was still waiting for an answer. "Yes–No. I mean– I suppose it would be more accurate to say… that he's one of mine." Aegon gripped the armrests of the chair tightly, his nails digging in. His heart beat harder.

He'd never told anyone about who he was, not even on the few occasions he'd been allowed to get deep into his cups. He was told who he was, he'd never told anyone. It had never been his secret to share, but Jon's, or Lemore's, or even Illyrio's or Varys'. But it was his.

"Oh?" Maester Aemon hummed again. "The Young Griff then? I labored under the delusion that it was your father who brought you here." There was humor in the ghostly softness of his voice.

Clydas had said that Haldon had talked of him, so it shouldn't have set him off balance to hear their years old cover story escape the old man's lips, but it did. Griff. The Young Griff. The name that had been his, that had been his pride for so much of his life. A false name; a fiction. No. Not false. It wasn't false, but it wasn't the entire story.

Seven hells, why is this so difficult? Aegon let go of the hand rests. "Yes," he said after far too long, "but also no. Griff fathered no sons, but he is still my father."

Aemon simply nodded. "It is a good man that takes another's son as his own, but there is more to this, I feel. More than an adoption."

"There is," Aegon said. "It's–It's about my sire."

"Well I should hope it is not me," Aemon said, offering a breathy laugh. It was disconcerting that the laughter couldn't make it to his eyes. "Forgive an old man his humors, do continue."

Aegon smiled, belatedly realizing that the old maester couldn't see it. "Worry not," he said. "Duck, he–my friend– he's a man of many jests." Coughing to try to clear his throat, Aegon tried to refocus. He'd been the one to make contact, but it felt as though he'd been the one cornered. "But my sire…. You knew him."

Aemon shifted in his chair, turning to face Aegon directly. The milky white eyes couldn't meet Aegon's gaze, but he felt as though they pierced him nonetheless. "I have known many men."

"This one was different. He wrote letters to you, I'm told." He felt every breath in his chest. It was agonizing.

The old man's brow furrowed, and his mouth began to move silently. "Many have written me letters, as maester–"

"Rhaegar Targaryen." Aegon looked to the fire. "Rhaegar Targaryen," he said again as his breathing gradually eased. He breathed in and out. His eyes turned back to the dim gaze of one of the last dragons. "My father was Rhaegar Targaryen."

Aegon was acutely aware of Aemon's breathing slowing. If this killed him, he didn't know how he should ever forgive himself.

Finally, the ancient man's lips cracked open. "A bastard?" he said, more to himself than Aegon. Then he shook his head vigorously, "No, no. He wasn't–" Aemon stopped suddenly. "Unless… the girl–"

"No," Aegon answered, summoning every ounce of kingly virtue he had. "Not a bastard, but trueborn. My mother was Princess Elia Martell of Dorne."

That sunk the man back into silence, until, "…the babe Aegon–but how?"

And then it was as if a dam had broken, or a blade pulled from his chest; everything came pouring out. "The babe who died in the Sack was not Aegon Targaryen," he said breathlessly, "he was an impostor, a pauper's son traded for a jug of wine–one babe looks much like another and Gregor Clegane was a monster– and my mother, Elia, she was a part of the charade, sh–sh–she knew my grandfather was a madman, so she gave me to the Spider–and Varys could keep me safe by staying on the small council and ensuring no one knew of my survival–and after Viserys died I didn't know if I would–"

"You are sure of this?" Aemon interrupted softly, voice torn halfway between hope and suspicion.

"Would I come all this way were I a mummer?" Aegon laughed derisively. "No, wait… I'm sorry, I mean–" He wracked his brain for the reasonable explanation he knew he had, "–my father, I mean Griff, the man who raised me. Griff is a falsity. He was a sellsword, yes, but before… he was more than that. He was–is Jon Connington." Another pang of guilt. He hadn't asked Jon if he could divulge that bit of information. "If any were to know the son of Rhaegar Targaryen…"

Aemon nodded slowly, "…it would be one of his boyhood friends, yes."

"I know that it bears the stink of fiction," Aegon said with a hard swallow, "but I didn't believe it myself, when Jon told me... I'd spent my whole life learning history, sums, poetry, swordplay, songs, everything. We moved from place to place for all but my earliest childhood years, from Free City to Free City, I had dyed my hair blue for as long as I could remember. And then it all just shifted into place. The inconsistencies, the vagueness, the excuses. It all made sense… Once I got over my anger at them keeping it from me for so long, I asked about my family–about my house." He stopped, tapping his fingers on the armrest.

"No fell purpose brings me here, uncle," Aegon continued. "Of that, you have my word."

"Then what?" Aemon asked, breath bated and blind eyes wide. "Why here and now?"

"…I know the histories; I know the wars and the politics, but I do not know who the Targaryens were. I would have the history of my family from a man who bore witness to it, from a man who might have been king."

Aemon smiled a wide smile, one that touched even the milky whites of his eyes. "I never thought I would have this chance." For a moment, Aegon thought the old man was beginning to choke and nearly jumped out of his seat.

Then Aegon saw Aemon Targaryen wipe away his tears with his long woolen sleeve and laugh lightly. Aegon turned his gaze to the roaring fire.

All he heard was his own shallow breathing, the crackling in the hearth, and the gradually fading hiccups of the old man bundled up like an infant. The fire consumed his sight in that moment, and for just a fraction of an instant, Aegon saw snow and eyes like blue stars. He jerked.

"There is one more thing." he said unsteadily.

"Oh?" Aemon asked, smiling.

"I had a dream, you see. A dream about dragons." He looked into the fire again. "About fire…"

Aemon's smile crumpled and died, and the light that had seemed to gather in his eyes fled. "…and ice?" he whispered.

"And ice."