Jevran
He-Who-Stalks-The-Forums
- Location
- Somewhere
I'll give details on that in the next two chapters.
The Last of the Dragonlords (ASOIAF SI)
- Thread starter Jevran
- Start date
I'll give details on that in the next two chapters.
I've always been of the belief that GRRM is trolling everyone with this series. The man wrote nothing but sci-fi for 40 years than all of a sudden wanted to write fantasy? That kind of doesn't happen. The only writer who's managed to pull off multi-genre writing in a long while is Stephen King and even then only because he writes like a madman and finishes stories so fast that no one has time to gainsay him. There is nothing in ASOIAF that can't be explained by telepathy or telekinesis. No absolute smashing of the rules by conjuring something out of nowhere, no instant transportation over a long distance, nothing changes colors on its own. GRRM truly believes that sci-fi and fantasy are the same thing (they aren't btw sci-fi is taking the rules of our universe to their fullest extent while fantasy/magic is to have the ability to break them entirely even if you choose to limit yourself to a set of rules) and so he wrote ASOIAF with that mindset. The series is a sci-fi tale in a medieval setting. That being said his decision to leave the exact genre up for interpretation has brought about some pretty good fanfic on both sides of the genre spectrum (sci-fi and fantasy) which is ironic as he hates fanfic lol. This story however is unique in its setting. You don't get many SI's that are there before the Doom so I'm quite excited to see how this turns out.
Chapter 3
Jevran
He-Who-Stalks-The-Forums
- Location
- Somewhere
-+-
Chapter 3
The Isle of Toads was a small forest covered island large enough to house a sizable population of natives in small villages scattered along the coast. It also had a small natural harbor that enabled us to anchor our ships in relative safety without the risk of a sudden summer storm smashing our vessels against the shore.
"This is a pigsty," Saerin muttered out of the corner of his mouth as he stood behind me and watched the crew come ashore in their small rowboats. "These people are savages."
I looked at the mud and thatch houses, the brown skinned and short haired natives who had disproportionately large round eyes and wide mouths that were naked from the waist up and wearing a sarong like garment, the dozens of children who had gathered around barefoot and often naked to watch us disembark.
"I'm glad I was born into the freehold," I said in the end. A large part of this world was primitive and the people lived in awful conditions. It was easy to forget that when you experience the civilization of the freehold all your life.
"As you say, my lord," Saerin said.
"Brother!"
I turned at that voice to see a young woman marching up to me, flanked on either side by a dark skinned man and a pale skinned woman. The man wore an opened faced helmet and a breastplate, both forged out of steel and shining in the noonday sun. There was also a sword sheathed at his waist and a dagger strapped to his boot. The woman wore a light blue Valyrian style dress and held a parasol which she held out to shield the young woman from the sun. The young woman herself wore a light blue Valyrian style dress that left her arms bare, wore armlets on her upper arms and bracelets on her wrists, both shaped like dragons biting their own tails, while a golden necklace set with rubies glinted at her throat. Her silver hair fell onto her shoulders in ringlets and framed her heart shaped face. Her royal purple eyes glinted as they bore into mine.
"Sister," I arranged my face into a smile. "How has the journey been treating you?"
"This is the most terrible experience I've ever had in my life! You are a demon from the lower hells come up to torment us all before dragging us down to hell with you!"
I blinked.
Well, at least she's being honest.
"Can't you think of this like an adventure?" I tried. "Our mother's ancestor became a legend when she blazed this trail for the first time. We are following in her footsteps."
"NO!"
I sighed.
This was my baby sister.
Valaena Melerys.
Seventeen and a brat.
I really should have left her behind.
Or tossed her overboard when we were crossing the Summer Sea.
Well, it was too late now.
-+-
After that wonderful meeting with my sibling, I didn't feel like stacking around to meet the rest of my family, so I went off to negotiate with the natives along with Captain Maero and a pair of guards.
Unfortunately, Valaena tagged along with her own entourage.
This wasn't surprising, because she had been following me around ever since she was old enough to walk. I distinctly remember a time when she was a chubby round thing that could barely talk and she was still following me around the house. Whether I was in the library, practicing with weapons in the house's central courtyard, shadowing my father to learn how he managed the family affrairs, she was always lurking in some corner and watching.
I really should have broken that habit in her.
"They look like savages," Valaena muttered as we watched Captain Maero talk with the village elders. "And they smell!"
"They are savages," I muttered back. "And I've been thinking about the smell. It does remind me of a pig sty. That's why I brought you here."
"I hate you."
"Behave, or I will marry you to one of these savages!" I promised while holding back my grin.
"You wouldn't dare!"
"Who is the high seat of our house again?"
She glared murder at me.
I gave up and grinned.
We were interrupted when Captain Maero came up to us, having finished his discussion with the elders. Said elders were a group of five men wearing the same sarong like garments all the men here wore. The only difference was that each of these men wore an elaborate headdress made out of feathers and bones, and that each of these elders was old and wrinkly, with the sparse hair on their head either white or gray. We were meeting in a large building located in the center of the village that seemed to be a meeting hall of sorts.
"They say that there is plenty of fish in the seas around the island, and good hunting in the forests," Maero said as he bowed to both me and Valaena. "I fear that they have little else in the way of amenities, and no goods for trade."
I looked over my shoulder at the primitive buildings that surrounded us, "That doesn't surprise me. Very well. Give everyone leave to come ashore and set up a proper camp. We'll use the beach. Organize hunting and fishing parties. And set up a group of our soldiers as a guard detail. I doubt these people will dare to cross us, but there is no need to risk anything."
"Yes, my lord."
"And one last thing," I said as he turned to go. "Tell the men not to indulge themselves with the natives. There is plenty of time for that when we reach Gogossos. We don't want them catching some disease we have no cure for."
"Yes, my lord."
Valaena tugged on my arm, when I turned to her she mouthed a word at me, "And tell the servants to get a baths ready."
-+-
Mere hours after that meeting, things were moving along, and the hunting and fishing parties were going out.
I myself volunteered for one hunting party. And naturally, the brat decided to come along too.
"Peacocks," she said incredulously as she stared at our chosen prey. "We're eating peacocks?"
Indeed, we were crouched behind a tree and watching a male peacock and a pair of females moving about in a small clearing.
"Those headdresses the elders wore came from somewhere," I said. "Now shoot!"
"But, they're so beautiful!" she complained.
"Their feathers are beautiful," I said. "Their meat is tasty. Now shoot. You can have the feathers after."
She grumbled, but she did put and arrow to her bow and take aim.
She was dressed for the occasion in a tunic that ended at her knees and left her arms bare and free. A pair of sandals protected her feet and a quiver of arrows was belted at her waist.
Dressed like that, with her bow in hand, she looked like how I pictured Artemis, the virgin goddess worshiped by ancient Greeks.
And like the goddess, her arrow flew true and the peacock squawked and trashed in its death throes.
"Stop grinning at me," she grumbled as she lowered her bow.
"I can't help it," I said as I reached out and poked her nose. She squeaked and swatted at me with her free hand. "Let's get one more kill and then we'll go back."
"Fine," she said. Behind her, a servant ran out to grab the dead bird she shot and retrieved it coming over to return the arrow to Valaena. "But no more peacocks."
"No more peacocks," I promised. "So, how are our cousins treating you? Are they enjoying the voyage?"
And she was back to glaring at me.
"They don't stop complaining," she ranted. "Both of them took sick and vomited all through the journey across the Summer Sea and spent the time cursing out you, your future wife, your future children, their future children, and so on for ten generations down. I feel like that villain in your story, Lord Vader of the Sith. I want to strangle them both with sorcery!"
"My poor Val," I patted her on her head. She was right, she really didn't deserve having our cousins inflicted on her. But it was a sad necessity.
When I packed up my worldly wealth and my family and embarked on this voyage, I took the precaution of spreading them out among the five ships. Otherwise there was the risk of our entire house going extinct if a sudden storm cost us the ship we were all sailing on. It was the same with our wealth. I took care to spread it out evenly among the ships so that the sudden loss of one will not leave us lacking in an important resource.
Don't put all your eggs in one basket and all that.
Unfortunately, this in turn created the risk, however light, of one of my more disgruntled family members commandeering the ship they were on and deciding to turn back or run off to one of the daughters. This voyage of mine wasn't exactly met with rousing cheers by my family.
I solved that problem by separating them from their children. Because, they were a lot less likely to try something if both they and their children were on separate ships.
This resulted in my cousins being loaded into one ship and my sister being appointed as their nominal nanny.
It had to be done.
Still….
"Pretend to take ill after eating the meat today," I told Valaena. "I'll have you brought to my ship and treated. That way, you can sail with me till Gogossos."
She hugged me.
I poked her nose again.
-+-
When we got back to the camp we had set up in the beach, things were already moving apace. There were pavilions and tents set up, their pristine white cloth standing out in stark contrast against the drab beach.
They also had a bath set up.
The servants had taken ten foot tall wooden poles and stuck them to the ground, marking a huge square that was easily fifty feet across. Then they had draped white cloth horizontally over the poles, effectively creating four walls and making it impossible for someone to see into the square. Then they placed bronze bathtubs inside the square and filled them with steaming hot water they heated in bronze cauldrons that they heated over log fires.
"Ohhhhh!" Valaena moaned as she sank into her tub. "This is perfect! I love you brother!"
"I'm glad you have finally seen the truth."
She snorted.
"Coming back to more important matters," I sank further into the tub until everything below my chin was submerged. "I plan to make a trip to the legendary Toad Stone and have a look at it. Maybe have a sketch of it made. According to the natives, there are the ruins of an ancient city around the stone as well. Will you come with me?"
"I don't want to march through the jungle to look at a stone that looks like a toad!" my baby sister informed me. "The hunting trip was enough."
"I also want to look at the city," I said placidly. The bath was making me feel too good for me to summon much emotion. "Make a map of the ruins."
"You are getting very interested in ancient ruins, cousin!" the voice made me turn and face a tall young man with Valyrian features with his long silver hair done up in a ponytail, who had stepped up to an empty bathtub and started to undress.
This was my only male cousin, Baelon Melerys. He was my second uncle's only son, and was only four years my younger.
"I'm interested in cities and how they were built," I said as he stripped off his tunic and stepped into the bath fully nude.
The people of the freehold did not care overmuch about nudity when it came to the baths and sports. In the private baths of located in the households and the public baths that open for all, you usually left your clothes at the door.
"We might have to build one soon," Baelon nodded and then grinned. "We will write our names into history."
Of all my family, Baelon was the most ardent supporter of my project.
"You're both mad! We'll starve to death or be killed by natives!"
And my baby sister was the most ardent dissenter.
-+-
Chapter 3
The Isle of Toads was a small forest covered island large enough to house a sizable population of natives in small villages scattered along the coast. It also had a small natural harbor that enabled us to anchor our ships in relative safety without the risk of a sudden summer storm smashing our vessels against the shore.
"This is a pigsty," Saerin muttered out of the corner of his mouth as he stood behind me and watched the crew come ashore in their small rowboats. "These people are savages."
I looked at the mud and thatch houses, the brown skinned and short haired natives who had disproportionately large round eyes and wide mouths that were naked from the waist up and wearing a sarong like garment, the dozens of children who had gathered around barefoot and often naked to watch us disembark.
"I'm glad I was born into the freehold," I said in the end. A large part of this world was primitive and the people lived in awful conditions. It was easy to forget that when you experience the civilization of the freehold all your life.
"As you say, my lord," Saerin said.
"Brother!"
I turned at that voice to see a young woman marching up to me, flanked on either side by a dark skinned man and a pale skinned woman. The man wore an opened faced helmet and a breastplate, both forged out of steel and shining in the noonday sun. There was also a sword sheathed at his waist and a dagger strapped to his boot. The woman wore a light blue Valyrian style dress and held a parasol which she held out to shield the young woman from the sun. The young woman herself wore a light blue Valyrian style dress that left her arms bare, wore armlets on her upper arms and bracelets on her wrists, both shaped like dragons biting their own tails, while a golden necklace set with rubies glinted at her throat. Her silver hair fell onto her shoulders in ringlets and framed her heart shaped face. Her royal purple eyes glinted as they bore into mine.
"Sister," I arranged my face into a smile. "How has the journey been treating you?"
"This is the most terrible experience I've ever had in my life! You are a demon from the lower hells come up to torment us all before dragging us down to hell with you!"
I blinked.
Well, at least she's being honest.
"Can't you think of this like an adventure?" I tried. "Our mother's ancestor became a legend when she blazed this trail for the first time. We are following in her footsteps."
"NO!"
I sighed.
This was my baby sister.
Valaena Melerys.
Seventeen and a brat.
I really should have left her behind.
Or tossed her overboard when we were crossing the Summer Sea.
Well, it was too late now.
-+-
After that wonderful meeting with my sibling, I didn't feel like stacking around to meet the rest of my family, so I went off to negotiate with the natives along with Captain Maero and a pair of guards.
Unfortunately, Valaena tagged along with her own entourage.
This wasn't surprising, because she had been following me around ever since she was old enough to walk. I distinctly remember a time when she was a chubby round thing that could barely talk and she was still following me around the house. Whether I was in the library, practicing with weapons in the house's central courtyard, shadowing my father to learn how he managed the family affrairs, she was always lurking in some corner and watching.
I really should have broken that habit in her.
"They look like savages," Valaena muttered as we watched Captain Maero talk with the village elders. "And they smell!"
"They are savages," I muttered back. "And I've been thinking about the smell. It does remind me of a pig sty. That's why I brought you here."
"I hate you."
"Behave, or I will marry you to one of these savages!" I promised while holding back my grin.
"You wouldn't dare!"
"Who is the high seat of our house again?"
She glared murder at me.
I gave up and grinned.
We were interrupted when Captain Maero came up to us, having finished his discussion with the elders. Said elders were a group of five men wearing the same sarong like garments all the men here wore. The only difference was that each of these men wore an elaborate headdress made out of feathers and bones, and that each of these elders was old and wrinkly, with the sparse hair on their head either white or gray. We were meeting in a large building located in the center of the village that seemed to be a meeting hall of sorts.
"They say that there is plenty of fish in the seas around the island, and good hunting in the forests," Maero said as he bowed to both me and Valaena. "I fear that they have little else in the way of amenities, and no goods for trade."
I looked over my shoulder at the primitive buildings that surrounded us, "That doesn't surprise me. Very well. Give everyone leave to come ashore and set up a proper camp. We'll use the beach. Organize hunting and fishing parties. And set up a group of our soldiers as a guard detail. I doubt these people will dare to cross us, but there is no need to risk anything."
"Yes, my lord."
"And one last thing," I said as he turned to go. "Tell the men not to indulge themselves with the natives. There is plenty of time for that when we reach Gogossos. We don't want them catching some disease we have no cure for."
"Yes, my lord."
Valaena tugged on my arm, when I turned to her she mouthed a word at me, "And tell the servants to get a baths ready."
-+-
Mere hours after that meeting, things were moving along, and the hunting and fishing parties were going out.
I myself volunteered for one hunting party. And naturally, the brat decided to come along too.
"Peacocks," she said incredulously as she stared at our chosen prey. "We're eating peacocks?"
Indeed, we were crouched behind a tree and watching a male peacock and a pair of females moving about in a small clearing.
"Those headdresses the elders wore came from somewhere," I said. "Now shoot!"
"But, they're so beautiful!" she complained.
"Their feathers are beautiful," I said. "Their meat is tasty. Now shoot. You can have the feathers after."
She grumbled, but she did put and arrow to her bow and take aim.
She was dressed for the occasion in a tunic that ended at her knees and left her arms bare and free. A pair of sandals protected her feet and a quiver of arrows was belted at her waist.
Dressed like that, with her bow in hand, she looked like how I pictured Artemis, the virgin goddess worshiped by ancient Greeks.
And like the goddess, her arrow flew true and the peacock squawked and trashed in its death throes.
"Stop grinning at me," she grumbled as she lowered her bow.
"I can't help it," I said as I reached out and poked her nose. She squeaked and swatted at me with her free hand. "Let's get one more kill and then we'll go back."
"Fine," she said. Behind her, a servant ran out to grab the dead bird she shot and retrieved it coming over to return the arrow to Valaena. "But no more peacocks."
"No more peacocks," I promised. "So, how are our cousins treating you? Are they enjoying the voyage?"
And she was back to glaring at me.
"They don't stop complaining," she ranted. "Both of them took sick and vomited all through the journey across the Summer Sea and spent the time cursing out you, your future wife, your future children, their future children, and so on for ten generations down. I feel like that villain in your story, Lord Vader of the Sith. I want to strangle them both with sorcery!"
"My poor Val," I patted her on her head. She was right, she really didn't deserve having our cousins inflicted on her. But it was a sad necessity.
When I packed up my worldly wealth and my family and embarked on this voyage, I took the precaution of spreading them out among the five ships. Otherwise there was the risk of our entire house going extinct if a sudden storm cost us the ship we were all sailing on. It was the same with our wealth. I took care to spread it out evenly among the ships so that the sudden loss of one will not leave us lacking in an important resource.
Don't put all your eggs in one basket and all that.
Unfortunately, this in turn created the risk, however light, of one of my more disgruntled family members commandeering the ship they were on and deciding to turn back or run off to one of the daughters. This voyage of mine wasn't exactly met with rousing cheers by my family.
I solved that problem by separating them from their children. Because, they were a lot less likely to try something if both they and their children were on separate ships.
This resulted in my cousins being loaded into one ship and my sister being appointed as their nominal nanny.
It had to be done.
Still….
"Pretend to take ill after eating the meat today," I told Valaena. "I'll have you brought to my ship and treated. That way, you can sail with me till Gogossos."
She hugged me.
I poked her nose again.
-+-
When we got back to the camp we had set up in the beach, things were already moving apace. There were pavilions and tents set up, their pristine white cloth standing out in stark contrast against the drab beach.
They also had a bath set up.
The servants had taken ten foot tall wooden poles and stuck them to the ground, marking a huge square that was easily fifty feet across. Then they had draped white cloth horizontally over the poles, effectively creating four walls and making it impossible for someone to see into the square. Then they placed bronze bathtubs inside the square and filled them with steaming hot water they heated in bronze cauldrons that they heated over log fires.
"Ohhhhh!" Valaena moaned as she sank into her tub. "This is perfect! I love you brother!"
"I'm glad you have finally seen the truth."
She snorted.
"Coming back to more important matters," I sank further into the tub until everything below my chin was submerged. "I plan to make a trip to the legendary Toad Stone and have a look at it. Maybe have a sketch of it made. According to the natives, there are the ruins of an ancient city around the stone as well. Will you come with me?"
"I don't want to march through the jungle to look at a stone that looks like a toad!" my baby sister informed me. "The hunting trip was enough."
"I also want to look at the city," I said placidly. The bath was making me feel too good for me to summon much emotion. "Make a map of the ruins."
"You are getting very interested in ancient ruins, cousin!" the voice made me turn and face a tall young man with Valyrian features with his long silver hair done up in a ponytail, who had stepped up to an empty bathtub and started to undress.
This was my only male cousin, Baelon Melerys. He was my second uncle's only son, and was only four years my younger.
"I'm interested in cities and how they were built," I said as he stripped off his tunic and stepped into the bath fully nude.
The people of the freehold did not care overmuch about nudity when it came to the baths and sports. In the private baths of located in the households and the public baths that open for all, you usually left your clothes at the door.
"We might have to build one soon," Baelon nodded and then grinned. "We will write our names into history."
Of all my family, Baelon was the most ardent supporter of my project.
"You're both mad! We'll starve to death or be killed by natives!"
And my baby sister was the most ardent dissenter.
-+-
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Well, that loyalty problem will be solved the moment Valyria blows up. Assuming, of course, that you survive that long.
RichardWhereat
Feanor did nothing wrong.
- Location
- Australia
Riding deinonychus around? Oh gods, these are the WHF Dark Elves... They're even going to look at the Slann.
EDIT: It's kind of a shame that he's not immortal. It'd be awesome to see him build an empire, and then sail a fleet of colony ships in to Westeros during the War of Five Kings to prepare for the Long Night.
EDIT: It's kind of a shame that he's not immortal. It'd be awesome to see him build an empire, and then sail a fleet of colony ships in to Westeros during the War of Five Kings to prepare for the Long Night.
Last edited:
- Location
- Tampere
He could just gather some more dragon eggs, hatch those and breed a large flight of them. So when the Long Night comes, and goes when a flight of dragons burns all the zombies down. The night king might be awesome op and immune but he is much easier to deal with if he's alone.
- Location
- Africa
this is a song of ice and fire story not game of thrones story, the night king was a show only thing in ASOIAF the others are more like some type of ice fay rather than snow zombies
Fabula Amanti
I want a Grimoire, but I got books.
- Location
- Singapore
If he really wants dragons, he could reconnect with the Targs to do some cultural exchange. I'd imagine conquering a new continent would bring a lot of new and exotic resources unheard of in the old world. Not to mention the legitimacy of being an actual dragon lord of Valyria carries a lot of clout.
Narrative wise, Sothoryos is basically a blank slate. We know it's a horrendous jungle biome akin to middle Africa but little else besides bad juju. Regardless, you can definitely make a case for a sweet spot of isolated virgin lands with a large river system. Such isolation would have unique problems sure but many don't seem to understand that just as the new world kills you, you kill the new world as well.
You are a modern person with the backing of Valyrian talents. They are arguably the most educated in the current world and if the effort is placed into surviving, miracles can happen.
Narrative wise, Sothoryos is basically a blank slate. We know it's a horrendous jungle biome akin to middle Africa but little else besides bad juju. Regardless, you can definitely make a case for a sweet spot of isolated virgin lands with a large river system. Such isolation would have unique problems sure but many don't seem to understand that just as the new world kills you, you kill the new world as well.
You are a modern person with the backing of Valyrian talents. They are arguably the most educated in the current world and if the effort is placed into surviving, miracles can happen.
Jevran
He-Who-Stalks-The-Forums
- Location
- Somewhere
That would be funny. Fell free to write it into an omake.
Last edited:
Chapter 4
Jevran
He-Who-Stalks-The-Forums
- Location
- Somewhere
-+-
Chapter 4
Journal #21,
It took a while before I could find the free time to write this.
Too much to do.
The Toad Stone turned out to be quite surprising. It was a giant statue of a toad carved out of an oily black stone the likes of which I had never seen before. Now, I'm no stranger to exotic stonework. I have seen the fused dragonstone we use for our major buildings, and the lesser version we use for our roads, but this stone was of a type I had never seen before. All attempts to acquire a sample for further study proved fruitless. The mystery stone resisted stone tools, steel picks, and even dragonsteel. I have never encountered a substance like this. The only method to get it somewhere civilized for testing was to uproot the entire stone and load it onto our ship, but it was too much even for my eccentric reputation.
We did get a few good sketches of the ruins around the stone, as well as a rough map, but the ruins were too far gone to get an accurate reading there as well. As far as I could tell, there used to be a walled city around the Toad Stone, with a large number of stone buildings located inside the walls. The ruins of the buildings immediately surrounding the stone were especially elaborate and had the look of temples or other prominent buildings.
Also, I could tell one more thing from the ruins.
They were old.
Just how old?
From the just the look of the stonework and how they've eroded, and from the records that said that the ruins were already quite old when the first Ghiscari colony ships came here, I'd say close to ten thousand years. All this points to an advanced society that exited in this island long before the great civilizations of Essos ever rose, and likely died out long before any in they built their first city.
Just how old was this world?
How old was civilization on this world?
That's a question I'll have to consider very carefully after a lot more research.
On other matters, we're making headway toward Gogossos and are planning to arrive there within the day. Once there, I plan to give the crew a good long shore leave before embarking again. After all, this is the last civilized outpost before we venture into the unknown. This will be the last such opportunity we have.
Aerion of House Melerys, on the 40th day after leaving the great city of Valyria.
I stopped writing and leaned back in my chair.
Just as I wrote in the journal, we were almost up to Gogossos, and I wanted to have one last meeting with the captain before we put to port. There was so much to do.
My eyes inadvertently snapped to the large steel bound chest that lay next to my bed. The chest that concealed the gift from Dany.
I also had to be very careful not to reveal to anyone in the city that I had a dragon egg.
The freehold too a very dim view of people from outside of the forty families being in possession of dragon eggs. But, once we're past the city, we should be fine. And once the freehold goes the way of the dodo, it wouldn't matter at all.
For now though, secrecy was the order of the day.
I sighed worked to put away my writing tools before getting up and making sure that the chest was properly locked and that the only key was in my possession.
Then I leisurely made my way out of my cabin and onto the main deck where both Captain Maero and my baby sister were.
"Greetings, sister," I said as I stepped onto the forecastle where she was hovering around the captain with her bodyguard and her maidservant hovering over her shoulders. "How close are we?"
"You can see it!" Valaena brandished a spyglass at me.
It was a bronze cylinder with two lenses fitted at both ends, whose length could be adjusted by a screwing motion to change the magnification of the contraption.
One of these was not as potent as a pair of binoculars from my old world, but it did it's job well enough.
I brought the spyglass to my eye and peered at the horizon, and sure enough, there was a city visible on the looming coastline.
"That's our destination?" I asked.
"Yes, my lord," Captain Maero confirmed. "That's Gogossos."
"I wonder what it will look like," Valaena speculated. "This is the farthest outpost of the freehold. It must be exotic."
"It'll be the same as any other city of the freehold," I said cheerfully. "There might be one or two details different, but overall it'll be the same."
"What do you mean?" Valaena demanded. "This is the most exotic city of the freehold!"
"Sister dear," I said patiently. "The freehold has colonization down to an art. All of her daughters are mother Valyria writ small. There is a giant wall surrounding the city and a series of estates surrounding it. In the center of the city there will be fourteen temples, the Hall of the Magisters, and the Triarch's Palace arranged around a huge central square. Then there will be a fighting pit, slave market, other market, public baths, pleasure houses, and manses for the magisters, and finally a harbor. I studied this remember? We have actual architects and engineers with us. Ask them if you doubt me."
Valaena grumbled.
"That is true, my lord," Captain Maero said. "That said, there are exotic slaves in the slave market. And the fighting pits have beasts from Sothoryos. They're a sight to see."
True, I did not think on that.
"Well then," I grinned at my sister. "We'll have to go and see the fights wont we?"
Her eyes lit up.
-+-
Gogossos was a good sized city by the standards of this world, but quite small if you compare her to Valyria itself. Its black walls rose fifty feet into the air, looming above the harbor and hiding the city proper from view. The harbor itself was located outside the city walls, and was shielded behind a circular seawall that was made out of the same black stone as the city walls. There was also a lighthouse built right into the seawall and the wall itself had two entrances into the harbor, both of which could be closed off by massive harbor chains.
When our little fleet came closer to Gogossos, a pair of war galleys emerged from behind its seawall and approached us.
After some signaling back and forth, they turned around and escorted us to the harbor itself, taking us through one of the two harbor gates.
The harbor itself was large enough for all five of our ships to dock with room left to spare, so we had no trouble from that quarter. When we got off the ship, we were met by an official looking delegation which comprised of a trio of robe wearing men who were obviously Valyrian who were backed by two dozen spear wielding soldiers dressed in steel breastplates and helmets.
"I am Magister Aurion," the man in the lead spread his arms in welcome. "Welcome to Gogossos, lord Melerys. We received word of your coming. Our noble Triarch welcomes you to the city and extends an invitation to join him for a feast at his palace this night."
I bowed, "I am Aerion Melerys, and I am gladdened to be welcome in your fair city."
"I would also like to extend an invitation for your family to lodge at my manse for the duration of your stay," Magister Aurion said. "It would be my honor to have you under my roof."
"Thank you," I bowed. It was traditional to have visitors of freeholder families lodge with other freeholder families when visiting one of the daughters. It was considered unseemly for us to lodge at a common inn like a landless commoner. "We would be honored."
Of course, we would have to give him something in return for his hospitality. It was considered polite to give a gift to the host if you stay under his roof. And it can't be some trinket either, it had to reflect both your station and the length of your stay.
"Shall we go to then?" the magister indicated a series of palanquins that were starting to arrive and line up behind us. "You must be weary from the journey."
"Let me give orders to my captain and assemble an honor guard," I looked over my shoulder at my disembarking men and the choas that was just beginning to unfold. "Then we will be at your disposal."
As it happened, it actually took several hours to get everything squared away, and I ended up sending most of the family ahead with a small honor guard and remaining behind with cousin Baelon.
We had to arrange quarters for the men, arrange to have the ships guarded by a rotating guard detail, arrange for funds for the men to spend while ashore, schedule meetings with all five of the ship captains and the ranking officers who commanded the soldiers who came with us, and arrange docking with the harbor master…….just to name a few.
"This is hard work, cousin," Baelon finally said when everything was done with. "Who knew making history was this hard."
"Wait till we actually land and get to work," I said as we finally walked towards the palanquins. "Then this will look like a frolic."
"Ha!" Baelon grinned. "At least it'll be worth it in the end. I just expected more excitement."
"It is a bit boring," I agreed. "But I'm fairly sure that there will be plenty of excitement along the way. The natives of the lands we take will not just move over and let us take their land after all."
"There will be battles," Baelon nodded as he settled into his palanquin. "Glorious battles!"
"And we will win them," I promised as four slaves lifted up his palanquin and started to bear him away. Silently though, I hoped that those battles could be kept to a minimum. Because we couldn't afford large scale combat losses. And it also wasn't a good idea to start any long term feuds with the natives when we might need their help down the line. I needed to at least try and establish friendly relations with whoever we meet.
While these thoughts ran through my mind, my own palanquin was being lifted and borne through the streets of the city towards the manse of Magister Aurion.
Magister was not exactly a title of nobility, not exactly. There were no nobles in the freehold.
We instead had a method of government that was part oligarchy and part democracy.
In common parlance, a freehold was a plot of land that was owned and worked by a freeman.
In Valyria, this word had a different meaning.
All the people who owned land around the mother city of Valyria were called freeholders. And these freeholders had two very special privileges, the right to vote and the right to run for office.
Once every seven years, the freeholders would gather in the city and hold an election to choose a number of magisters from among their number. The exact number varied, but the current number was around three hundred when we left. These magisters formed the Council of Magisters, the ruling body of the Valyrian Freehold. This council was led by three triarches who were chosen from among the magisters and they each served for a single year. These triarches were the nominal leaders of the freehold, and if all three of them were in agreement, they had the power to veto any decision that was made by the council.
The Council of Magisters made the laws the citizenry lived by, appointed the Archons that acted as military commanders that led the army and the fleet, and chose the judges that sentenced criminals.
In exchange for their privileges, the freeholders contributed to the defense of Valyria by serving as citizen soldiers who provided their own equipment and saw to their own training.
Or rather, they were supposed to.
These days they just acted as sponsors for companies of soldiers and warships that were under the command of the Council of Magisters. My own family had once been responsible for the training, equipping, and paying the salaries of three full companies of soldiers, more than three hundred men.
Of course, if you were one of the forty families like the Targaryens, you instead contributed dragonriders to the freehold. They were the only ones who still held to the old romantic ideal of the citizen soldier. They actually turned up and fought in the front lines when the freehold went to war. Well, their dragons did, but at least they were there.
All of Valyria's colonies followed the same model as the mother city, except on a smaller scale.
The first colonists claimed the land around the new city and became the freeholders of the new city. They elected a council of magisters from among their number, and these magisters in turn choose a triarch to lead the city itself. The new colony was protected by troops provided by the freeholders of the colony and not by the forces of the mother city.
If they wanted military help from mother Valriya, especially if they wanted dragoriders, then they had to pay for it.
Therefore, the Valyrian empire was more a loose confederation of colonies that acknowledged the authority of the mother city rather than a single centralized empire. Apart from the previously mentioned acknowledgment of authority, the colonies were actually pretty independent and had complete self government with only two exemptions. These two exemptions? They had to follow Valyrian law and use Valyrian coinage. Other than that, the cities were practically their own little kingdoms.
As I was borne through the streets of Gogossos by the slaves and a veritable river of humanity moved up and down the streets around us, I couldn't help but think that this system worked remarkably well. It effectively gave ownership of the new colony to the freeholders who lived in it, and they worked hard to get the colony to be a success. Not to mention it also motivated them to defend the colony with the vigor of a man defending his home.
I blinked.
There, passing my palanquin on the street, was an elephant.
Not the tiny dwarf elephants they had in Volantis, but a full sized African elephant with gleaming ivory tusks as long as a man was tall and towering far above the men and woman that walked down the street. There was a howdah mounted on its back, and I could see the vague outline of someone on top of it.
Gods and demons.
If they had elephants here on this island, actual elephants, then what will they have in the continent itself?
Dinosaurs? Wild dragons?
I felt my heart start to thump in my chest.
This voyage was about avoiding the doom and preserving Valyrian culture, but there was nothing stopping it from also turning into a voyage of discovery.
-+-
Chapter 4
Journal #21,
It took a while before I could find the free time to write this.
Too much to do.
The Toad Stone turned out to be quite surprising. It was a giant statue of a toad carved out of an oily black stone the likes of which I had never seen before. Now, I'm no stranger to exotic stonework. I have seen the fused dragonstone we use for our major buildings, and the lesser version we use for our roads, but this stone was of a type I had never seen before. All attempts to acquire a sample for further study proved fruitless. The mystery stone resisted stone tools, steel picks, and even dragonsteel. I have never encountered a substance like this. The only method to get it somewhere civilized for testing was to uproot the entire stone and load it onto our ship, but it was too much even for my eccentric reputation.
We did get a few good sketches of the ruins around the stone, as well as a rough map, but the ruins were too far gone to get an accurate reading there as well. As far as I could tell, there used to be a walled city around the Toad Stone, with a large number of stone buildings located inside the walls. The ruins of the buildings immediately surrounding the stone were especially elaborate and had the look of temples or other prominent buildings.
Also, I could tell one more thing from the ruins.
They were old.
Just how old?
From the just the look of the stonework and how they've eroded, and from the records that said that the ruins were already quite old when the first Ghiscari colony ships came here, I'd say close to ten thousand years. All this points to an advanced society that exited in this island long before the great civilizations of Essos ever rose, and likely died out long before any in they built their first city.
Just how old was this world?
How old was civilization on this world?
That's a question I'll have to consider very carefully after a lot more research.
On other matters, we're making headway toward Gogossos and are planning to arrive there within the day. Once there, I plan to give the crew a good long shore leave before embarking again. After all, this is the last civilized outpost before we venture into the unknown. This will be the last such opportunity we have.
Aerion of House Melerys, on the 40th day after leaving the great city of Valyria.
I stopped writing and leaned back in my chair.
Just as I wrote in the journal, we were almost up to Gogossos, and I wanted to have one last meeting with the captain before we put to port. There was so much to do.
My eyes inadvertently snapped to the large steel bound chest that lay next to my bed. The chest that concealed the gift from Dany.
I also had to be very careful not to reveal to anyone in the city that I had a dragon egg.
The freehold too a very dim view of people from outside of the forty families being in possession of dragon eggs. But, once we're past the city, we should be fine. And once the freehold goes the way of the dodo, it wouldn't matter at all.
For now though, secrecy was the order of the day.
I sighed worked to put away my writing tools before getting up and making sure that the chest was properly locked and that the only key was in my possession.
Then I leisurely made my way out of my cabin and onto the main deck where both Captain Maero and my baby sister were.
"Greetings, sister," I said as I stepped onto the forecastle where she was hovering around the captain with her bodyguard and her maidservant hovering over her shoulders. "How close are we?"
"You can see it!" Valaena brandished a spyglass at me.
It was a bronze cylinder with two lenses fitted at both ends, whose length could be adjusted by a screwing motion to change the magnification of the contraption.
One of these was not as potent as a pair of binoculars from my old world, but it did it's job well enough.
I brought the spyglass to my eye and peered at the horizon, and sure enough, there was a city visible on the looming coastline.
"That's our destination?" I asked.
"Yes, my lord," Captain Maero confirmed. "That's Gogossos."
"I wonder what it will look like," Valaena speculated. "This is the farthest outpost of the freehold. It must be exotic."
"It'll be the same as any other city of the freehold," I said cheerfully. "There might be one or two details different, but overall it'll be the same."
"What do you mean?" Valaena demanded. "This is the most exotic city of the freehold!"
"Sister dear," I said patiently. "The freehold has colonization down to an art. All of her daughters are mother Valyria writ small. There is a giant wall surrounding the city and a series of estates surrounding it. In the center of the city there will be fourteen temples, the Hall of the Magisters, and the Triarch's Palace arranged around a huge central square. Then there will be a fighting pit, slave market, other market, public baths, pleasure houses, and manses for the magisters, and finally a harbor. I studied this remember? We have actual architects and engineers with us. Ask them if you doubt me."
Valaena grumbled.
"That is true, my lord," Captain Maero said. "That said, there are exotic slaves in the slave market. And the fighting pits have beasts from Sothoryos. They're a sight to see."
True, I did not think on that.
"Well then," I grinned at my sister. "We'll have to go and see the fights wont we?"
Her eyes lit up.
-+-
Gogossos was a good sized city by the standards of this world, but quite small if you compare her to Valyria itself. Its black walls rose fifty feet into the air, looming above the harbor and hiding the city proper from view. The harbor itself was located outside the city walls, and was shielded behind a circular seawall that was made out of the same black stone as the city walls. There was also a lighthouse built right into the seawall and the wall itself had two entrances into the harbor, both of which could be closed off by massive harbor chains.
When our little fleet came closer to Gogossos, a pair of war galleys emerged from behind its seawall and approached us.
After some signaling back and forth, they turned around and escorted us to the harbor itself, taking us through one of the two harbor gates.
The harbor itself was large enough for all five of our ships to dock with room left to spare, so we had no trouble from that quarter. When we got off the ship, we were met by an official looking delegation which comprised of a trio of robe wearing men who were obviously Valyrian who were backed by two dozen spear wielding soldiers dressed in steel breastplates and helmets.
"I am Magister Aurion," the man in the lead spread his arms in welcome. "Welcome to Gogossos, lord Melerys. We received word of your coming. Our noble Triarch welcomes you to the city and extends an invitation to join him for a feast at his palace this night."
I bowed, "I am Aerion Melerys, and I am gladdened to be welcome in your fair city."
"I would also like to extend an invitation for your family to lodge at my manse for the duration of your stay," Magister Aurion said. "It would be my honor to have you under my roof."
"Thank you," I bowed. It was traditional to have visitors of freeholder families lodge with other freeholder families when visiting one of the daughters. It was considered unseemly for us to lodge at a common inn like a landless commoner. "We would be honored."
Of course, we would have to give him something in return for his hospitality. It was considered polite to give a gift to the host if you stay under his roof. And it can't be some trinket either, it had to reflect both your station and the length of your stay.
"Shall we go to then?" the magister indicated a series of palanquins that were starting to arrive and line up behind us. "You must be weary from the journey."
"Let me give orders to my captain and assemble an honor guard," I looked over my shoulder at my disembarking men and the choas that was just beginning to unfold. "Then we will be at your disposal."
As it happened, it actually took several hours to get everything squared away, and I ended up sending most of the family ahead with a small honor guard and remaining behind with cousin Baelon.
We had to arrange quarters for the men, arrange to have the ships guarded by a rotating guard detail, arrange for funds for the men to spend while ashore, schedule meetings with all five of the ship captains and the ranking officers who commanded the soldiers who came with us, and arrange docking with the harbor master…….just to name a few.
"This is hard work, cousin," Baelon finally said when everything was done with. "Who knew making history was this hard."
"Wait till we actually land and get to work," I said as we finally walked towards the palanquins. "Then this will look like a frolic."
"Ha!" Baelon grinned. "At least it'll be worth it in the end. I just expected more excitement."
"It is a bit boring," I agreed. "But I'm fairly sure that there will be plenty of excitement along the way. The natives of the lands we take will not just move over and let us take their land after all."
"There will be battles," Baelon nodded as he settled into his palanquin. "Glorious battles!"
"And we will win them," I promised as four slaves lifted up his palanquin and started to bear him away. Silently though, I hoped that those battles could be kept to a minimum. Because we couldn't afford large scale combat losses. And it also wasn't a good idea to start any long term feuds with the natives when we might need their help down the line. I needed to at least try and establish friendly relations with whoever we meet.
While these thoughts ran through my mind, my own palanquin was being lifted and borne through the streets of the city towards the manse of Magister Aurion.
Magister was not exactly a title of nobility, not exactly. There were no nobles in the freehold.
We instead had a method of government that was part oligarchy and part democracy.
In common parlance, a freehold was a plot of land that was owned and worked by a freeman.
In Valyria, this word had a different meaning.
All the people who owned land around the mother city of Valyria were called freeholders. And these freeholders had two very special privileges, the right to vote and the right to run for office.
Once every seven years, the freeholders would gather in the city and hold an election to choose a number of magisters from among their number. The exact number varied, but the current number was around three hundred when we left. These magisters formed the Council of Magisters, the ruling body of the Valyrian Freehold. This council was led by three triarches who were chosen from among the magisters and they each served for a single year. These triarches were the nominal leaders of the freehold, and if all three of them were in agreement, they had the power to veto any decision that was made by the council.
The Council of Magisters made the laws the citizenry lived by, appointed the Archons that acted as military commanders that led the army and the fleet, and chose the judges that sentenced criminals.
In exchange for their privileges, the freeholders contributed to the defense of Valyria by serving as citizen soldiers who provided their own equipment and saw to their own training.
Or rather, they were supposed to.
These days they just acted as sponsors for companies of soldiers and warships that were under the command of the Council of Magisters. My own family had once been responsible for the training, equipping, and paying the salaries of three full companies of soldiers, more than three hundred men.
Of course, if you were one of the forty families like the Targaryens, you instead contributed dragonriders to the freehold. They were the only ones who still held to the old romantic ideal of the citizen soldier. They actually turned up and fought in the front lines when the freehold went to war. Well, their dragons did, but at least they were there.
All of Valyria's colonies followed the same model as the mother city, except on a smaller scale.
The first colonists claimed the land around the new city and became the freeholders of the new city. They elected a council of magisters from among their number, and these magisters in turn choose a triarch to lead the city itself. The new colony was protected by troops provided by the freeholders of the colony and not by the forces of the mother city.
If they wanted military help from mother Valriya, especially if they wanted dragoriders, then they had to pay for it.
Therefore, the Valyrian empire was more a loose confederation of colonies that acknowledged the authority of the mother city rather than a single centralized empire. Apart from the previously mentioned acknowledgment of authority, the colonies were actually pretty independent and had complete self government with only two exemptions. These two exemptions? They had to follow Valyrian law and use Valyrian coinage. Other than that, the cities were practically their own little kingdoms.
As I was borne through the streets of Gogossos by the slaves and a veritable river of humanity moved up and down the streets around us, I couldn't help but think that this system worked remarkably well. It effectively gave ownership of the new colony to the freeholders who lived in it, and they worked hard to get the colony to be a success. Not to mention it also motivated them to defend the colony with the vigor of a man defending his home.
I blinked.
There, passing my palanquin on the street, was an elephant.
Not the tiny dwarf elephants they had in Volantis, but a full sized African elephant with gleaming ivory tusks as long as a man was tall and towering far above the men and woman that walked down the street. There was a howdah mounted on its back, and I could see the vague outline of someone on top of it.
Gods and demons.
If they had elephants here on this island, actual elephants, then what will they have in the continent itself?
Dinosaurs? Wild dragons?
I felt my heart start to thump in my chest.
This voyage was about avoiding the doom and preserving Valyrian culture, but there was nothing stopping it from also turning into a voyage of discovery.
-+-
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- Location
- California
Dinosaur riding Valryians. Just imagine riding a triceratops to battle while you have raptor assault troopers running for flanks and the great T Rex bites through the middle of enemy formation
RichardWhereat
Feanor did nothing wrong.
- Location
- Australia
Probably wyverns, not dragons.
AzureShogun
Tanks are better than Mechs
- Location
- United Kingdom
Everyone else will be stuck playing crusader Kings, while this guy gets Ark:SE
- Location
- earth
Not the best, he says.
Sure, in the same way hydrochloric acid is slightly unpleasant when ingested.
Sothoryos is a damn interesting place, but it wouldn't be my first choice for a civilisation to form.
Notice
- Location
- Georgia
I'm ready to see the civilization building aspect that you make showing the build up of the colony and time passes. that should be pretty cool as a part time skip, part exposition.
Fabula Amanti
I want a Grimoire, but I got books.
- Location
- Singapore
This reminds me of the EU4 mod Third Odyssey, where the Byzantines foreseeing their end with the Turks surrounding them chose to instead pack up as much wealth and knowledge they can carry with them and sail into the West into the great unknown and inexplicably discovered the Americas. From there, history gets ahistorical as the decisions you make on what and who you, the player as the Byzantines, take with you and other events change what your starting position in the new world.
Right now, funnily enough, parallels an event with the Portuguese as you cross the Straits of Gibraltar where you can scare them about what you would expect at the other end of your journey or give them the truth of your suspicions that there might be something more. Either prevent them from starting their explorations to give yourself more time to establish yourself or create trust in a long-term ally for your inevitable return to Europe and Constantinople.
If we are following the mods logic, the next event to take place would be a great storm that terrorises the fleet and challenges their faith. It also can fling the ships further south than any has gone before into perhaps a Bay that is an ideal place to set up a colony and eventually New Valyria.
Right now, funnily enough, parallels an event with the Portuguese as you cross the Straits of Gibraltar where you can scare them about what you would expect at the other end of your journey or give them the truth of your suspicions that there might be something more. Either prevent them from starting their explorations to give yourself more time to establish yourself or create trust in a long-term ally for your inevitable return to Europe and Constantinople.
If we are following the mods logic, the next event to take place would be a great storm that terrorises the fleet and challenges their faith. It also can fling the ships further south than any has gone before into perhaps a Bay that is an ideal place to set up a colony and eventually New Valyria.
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Jevran
He-Who-Stalks-The-Forums
- Location
- Somewhere
Fabula Amanti
I want a Grimoire, but I got books.
- Location
- Singapore
All credit goes to the fantastic mod makers of Third Odyssey, I'm just reporting on some of the many fun events that lead to a North America dominated by Neo-Byzantines called Elysians.That's a remarkably well thought out plan.
Fun fact, a ship presumed lost in the storm event I mentioned would up in Bermuda and the survivors managed to flourish on the island. A couple of decades passed and the Elysians finally managed a ship that ranged far enough and found them. Then as the player, you can ignore them, annexe and integrate them to the new order or preserve their autonomy as a vassal. If they are vassals when you discover the Carribean islands you can allow them rights to the island and they become your go-to naval subject.
Fun fact 2, turns out Vikings made it to Greenland and Canada and were there the whole time, though they were not very populous. They become your first trading partners and make very good mercenaries. Eventually, a civil war breaks out between two factions of Vikings and you can choose who to back for your benefit. The ones who trade with you or the ones who fight for you. Or take the third option and allow the mercenaries you hired to settle your lands in exchange for military service as the Varangian Gaurd.
Fun fact 3, one of your dynasty gets bored of New Elysian life and gets the idea to take an expedition to further unknown. You can choose how much to support him in that endeavour ranging from nothing or sending an army with him. Turns out, he goes all conqueror on the Aztecs and Mayans and proclaims the Kingdom of Sparta as his new domain. Yup, Central America became New Sparta.
As I said, fun mod with a lot of fun events. And that's not even getting to the wonders you can build like your own Titan of Braavos, Library of Alexandria, researching into Greek Fire, retaining the lost art of making Byzantine Silks. Imagine what you can do with Valyrian lore. Refining the Valyrain Steel process, Dragon Lore, sorcery and magic. An entirely new social culture inspired by you modern take merged with Valyrian values. New founding families with the original settlers becoming the new 1st estate. Endless possibilities really.
- Location
- Italy
I hope he did place a "Doom cache" on each ship, with plans for architecture, science and magic. Just to be safe.
Personally with the knowledge (even a spotty one) of medicine and mechanics from our world creating a colony on the local equivalent of Lustria wouldn't be impossible, it would need a lot effort and unless he pull off a "Melony of lot 7" he'll be hard pressed to see it's results
Personally with the knowledge (even a spotty one) of medicine and mechanics from our world creating a colony on the local equivalent of Lustria wouldn't be impossible, it would need a lot effort and unless he pull off a "Melony of lot 7" he'll be hard pressed to see it's results
Chapter 5
Jevran
He-Who-Stalks-The-Forums
- Location
- Somewhere
-+-
Chapter 5
After that palanquin ride through the city, I ended up at the manse of Magister Aurion. It was a lavish affair with dozens of rooms, halls, and courtyards. There, I was finally able to relax and sleep in a proper bed for the first time since our voyage began. The very next morning however, I was invited to breakfast with the city's triarch.
This was not the kind of invite you refuse.
So, I roused myself, made myself presentable, and got myself over to the triarch's palace.
The ruler of the city was a man of middle years and obvious Valyrian features.
He had long silver blonde hair that fell to his broad shoulders, and sharp purple eyes set in a square face whose most notable feature was a hooked nose. He wore a purple knee-length tunic that left his shoulders and arms bare in the Valirian style, with polished leather sandals whose straps came up to his knees. There were gem encrusted golden bracers on his arms, and a thin gold circlet upon his head that was also encrusted with gems.
All in all, he looked like a man who had done his job for decades and someone who had been toughened by this land he lived in and the city he ruled over.
"Archon Aerion," his voice and deep and gravelly, and fit his image perfectly. "Welcome to Gogossos."
Archon was my official title.
The word was complicated, and its exact meaning changed depending on the context. If it was given to the leader of an army, then the word meant general. If it was given to the leader of a fleet, then it meant admiral. If it was given to the commander of a garrison that occupied a city or a fortress, then it meant military governor. Right now, I was an admiral, but once the voyage was over and the colony established, I would be a military governor.
Come to think of it, I now had the same rank as Dany's father. Lord Targaryen was an archon now, commanding the westernmost outpost of the freehold.
I couldn't help my lips twisting in a smile, and the triarch probably thought I was happy to see him.
I moved to quickly capitalize on that, "It's an honor to be welcome in your fair city. It's so exotic! The creatures I saw! There was an elephant on the street and it was massive!"
He laughed, "We make regular raids into the continent to retrieve new beasts and slaves. Both commodities are well received in the mother city."
Ah yes.
The peninsula was in a very unique position because it lacked very little.
It was remarkably fertile due to the constant volcanic activity. And, due to the peninsula being strategically located right in the middle of the lands of summer, the climate was always warm despite the seasons. This meant that agriculture flourished, making it unnecessary to import food. The fourteen flames were rich in gold, silver and iron, making it unnecessary to import any of that from the colonies.
Mother Valyria in truth only imported two things.
Exotic items and slaves.
The majority of slaves worked the mines that made Valyria rich, and they also toiled in the great estates of the freeholders where they grew crops and reared livestock. The life of a field worker was hard, but it was paradise when compared to what it was like in the mines.
Nine out of ten slaves who went into the mines died before an year was out.
So there was always a constant demand for slaves in the freehold.
The exotic items on the other hand, were for the amusement of the freeholders.
"If you would permit, I would very much like to see some of those," I said. For one, I was honestly curious, and it would be a good previews of what we have to look forward to.
"I will be holding three days of games in our fighting pits to honor your arrival and to celebrate your noble mission!" the triarch said to my surprise. "During that you'll see the beasts and men you have never seen before! I swear to you, it'll be three days you will never forget!"
"I'm honored," I said and bowed. "I am unworthy of such honor. I'm sure I will remember this event fondly all my days."
"I know you will," the triarch smiled. "Now, let's get the formalities over with. May I see your writ?"
"Certainly," I produced a scroll case from my waist and handed it over.
It contained my writ of authority.
Because you couldn't just pack your bags and leave the freehold. Instead, you needed a writ of authority granted by the council of magisters that relived you of your citizenship duties and gave you authority to found a new colony and rule it as a client of the mother city. No one was exempt from this law. Not even if you were a dragonlord. Dany's father actually had to go and get a writ appointing him Archon of Dragonstone before the Targaryens could leave the mother city with their dragons and their wealth.
The things that man did for his daughter.
Respect.
"That's all in order," the triarch said and handed the scroll case back to me before intoning formally. "I acknowledge you as acting under the authority of the Council of Magisters and your mission as under their aegis. Furthermore, as they have commanded, I will grant you all aid that is in my power to grant."
I bowed, "I am honored, noble triarch."
-+-
Two days after that meeting, the big day came, and I ended up in the fighting pit with my family, watching the action unfold from the seats placed well above the pit.
The fighting pits were something we were said to have adopted from the Ghiscari.
I was told by the architects I consulted that the fighting pits in the cities of Slavers bay were actual pits that had been dug into the earth and seats carved around their mouths. The ones copied by the Valyrians were built more in the style of roman arenas. It was a circular area that had been walled off and seats built in rising tiers so that it could accommodate tens of thousands of people. The area beneath the seats and the area underneath the floor of the fighting pit was a maze of animal pens, prisoner cells, armories, changing rooms and prop rooms.
It was a marvel of engineering that had been built to glorify ritual murder.
Being honored guests and carrying the personal invitation of the triarch, my family and I were given the prime seats in the triarch's stand. It was a front row viewing platform that was both raised and separated from the surrounding normal seats.
"This is magnificent!" Valaena exclaimed as she gripped my hand with an ear to ear grin on her face.
"I'm sure It'll be, sister," I agreed.
I had to raise my voice and all but should to talk to her, because the crowd surrounding us was screaming their heads off like the deranged fans at a rock concert.
This ruckus became even louder when the triarch stood up and raised a hand palm upwards, and a pair of slaves immediately took that as a signal to bang on a metal giant bronze gong with giant bronze hammers. The sound echoed throughout the fighting pit even over the screams of the crowd.
For an instant, the entire crowd fell silent.
Then the screaming began again, twice as loud.
A ten foot tall interior wall separated the floor of the fighting pit from the viewers seats, and the first row of seats were actually set upon the interior wall. I guessed that it was built that way to prevent the fighters and beasts in the pit from attempting to attack the audience. There were gates set along this interior wall at periodic intervals, some of them the height of a man, and others thrice the height of a man.
One of those larger gates now burst open, and a beast I had never seen before ran roaring into the fighting pit.
It looked like a giant crocodile that had evolved to live on land. It had long jaws set with rows of sharp teeth, four strong legs that lifted it's body a good four feet above the ground, and a long reptilian tail dragged along behind it as it moved. Muddy green scales covered it's entire body, looking for all the world as if it was wearing a suit of scale armor.
"What is that?" Valaena demanded as she bent forwards and stared with wide eyes. "I've never seen it before."
"It's a creature we call a forest drake," the triarch said from where he sat. "They live in the deep jungles and are hard to find and harder to catch. Even for us, this is a rare sight."
Even as he was speaking, the other fighter had entered the pit.
It was a man wearing only a loincloth and an open helmet, carrying a sword and a spear for weapons.
I made an educated guess that this was a slave.
The roar of the watching crowd became even louder.
If I had been in my old life and old body, this sight would have made me nauseous.
But now, after living in the freehold for twenty seven years, this really didn't bother me.
As the forest drake leaped on the slave to bite off his arm in a spray of blood and the screaming man ineffectually hacked at the beast with his sword, I felt only vaguely uncomfortable.
I guess Valyria really has changed me.
-+-
It was late when I finally got back to the manse, but I had one last task to do before I took to my bed.
I locked the doors of my room securely, and then went over to the large wooden writing desk that was in the room before bending down to unlock the steel bound wooden chest that was right next to it. From the assorted valuables inside, I retrieved a jet black dragonglass candle that was as long as my forearm and twisted around itself into a misshapen, ugly form.
I placed the candle upon the desk and reached out with the index finger on my right arm to touch the very top of the candle and pressed down so that the sharp edge of the artifact drew blood.
A moment later, the candle ignited with a small yellow flame that burned without any fuel.
I drew in a deep breath and focused.
With these candles, the sorcerers of Valyria could perform a number of arts, such as far speaking, far seeing, dream walking, and even future sight.
Normally, the archons and magisters employed specialized sorcerers for this task, with such sorcerers trained in special temples.
But I had gone out of my way to learn the art myself.
"Aerion? Is that you?"
And I wasn't the only one.
"Greetings, Daenys," I smiled as I cast the thought out, the candle carrying my mind's words across sea and land. "I'm pleasantly surprised to see you are at your candle. I was prepared to walk in your dreams."
"Do you remember what we were thought at the temple?" she cast back. "Always be at your candle at the final bell. If someone wishes to speak to you, they will do so then."
"I remember," I smiled. Those were the days. "I have to report to the mother city, but I'm glad I have this moment to speak with you. How goes your own voyage? We're in Gogossos now, resting and gathering supplies. From here we will be sailing into unknown lands."
"We're in Volantis," Dany cast back. Volantis, the first daughter of Valyria, and the largest city outside of the peninsula. "We too will go west soon. Our ships will sail along the coast and we will keep pace on dragon back. Father estimates that we will be sailing into Dragonstone in two months time if we go at a slow pace."
"Good," I sighed. "I myself can give no estimate as to when I will reach my destination. But hopefully. It will be less than a year."
"You will succeed," Dany assured me. "Do not give up hope! You will succeed and write your name into history! This, I have seen."
"That does give me hope," I smiled.
I was a fake prophet, with my knowledge of the future coming from an unusual source. Dany on the other hand, was the real thing. So her word meant a lot.
And I will take any advantage I can get.
-+-
Chapter 5
After that palanquin ride through the city, I ended up at the manse of Magister Aurion. It was a lavish affair with dozens of rooms, halls, and courtyards. There, I was finally able to relax and sleep in a proper bed for the first time since our voyage began. The very next morning however, I was invited to breakfast with the city's triarch.
This was not the kind of invite you refuse.
So, I roused myself, made myself presentable, and got myself over to the triarch's palace.
The ruler of the city was a man of middle years and obvious Valyrian features.
He had long silver blonde hair that fell to his broad shoulders, and sharp purple eyes set in a square face whose most notable feature was a hooked nose. He wore a purple knee-length tunic that left his shoulders and arms bare in the Valirian style, with polished leather sandals whose straps came up to his knees. There were gem encrusted golden bracers on his arms, and a thin gold circlet upon his head that was also encrusted with gems.
All in all, he looked like a man who had done his job for decades and someone who had been toughened by this land he lived in and the city he ruled over.
"Archon Aerion," his voice and deep and gravelly, and fit his image perfectly. "Welcome to Gogossos."
Archon was my official title.
The word was complicated, and its exact meaning changed depending on the context. If it was given to the leader of an army, then the word meant general. If it was given to the leader of a fleet, then it meant admiral. If it was given to the commander of a garrison that occupied a city or a fortress, then it meant military governor. Right now, I was an admiral, but once the voyage was over and the colony established, I would be a military governor.
Come to think of it, I now had the same rank as Dany's father. Lord Targaryen was an archon now, commanding the westernmost outpost of the freehold.
I couldn't help my lips twisting in a smile, and the triarch probably thought I was happy to see him.
I moved to quickly capitalize on that, "It's an honor to be welcome in your fair city. It's so exotic! The creatures I saw! There was an elephant on the street and it was massive!"
He laughed, "We make regular raids into the continent to retrieve new beasts and slaves. Both commodities are well received in the mother city."
Ah yes.
The peninsula was in a very unique position because it lacked very little.
It was remarkably fertile due to the constant volcanic activity. And, due to the peninsula being strategically located right in the middle of the lands of summer, the climate was always warm despite the seasons. This meant that agriculture flourished, making it unnecessary to import food. The fourteen flames were rich in gold, silver and iron, making it unnecessary to import any of that from the colonies.
Mother Valyria in truth only imported two things.
Exotic items and slaves.
The majority of slaves worked the mines that made Valyria rich, and they also toiled in the great estates of the freeholders where they grew crops and reared livestock. The life of a field worker was hard, but it was paradise when compared to what it was like in the mines.
Nine out of ten slaves who went into the mines died before an year was out.
So there was always a constant demand for slaves in the freehold.
The exotic items on the other hand, were for the amusement of the freeholders.
"If you would permit, I would very much like to see some of those," I said. For one, I was honestly curious, and it would be a good previews of what we have to look forward to.
"I will be holding three days of games in our fighting pits to honor your arrival and to celebrate your noble mission!" the triarch said to my surprise. "During that you'll see the beasts and men you have never seen before! I swear to you, it'll be three days you will never forget!"
"I'm honored," I said and bowed. "I am unworthy of such honor. I'm sure I will remember this event fondly all my days."
"I know you will," the triarch smiled. "Now, let's get the formalities over with. May I see your writ?"
"Certainly," I produced a scroll case from my waist and handed it over.
It contained my writ of authority.
Because you couldn't just pack your bags and leave the freehold. Instead, you needed a writ of authority granted by the council of magisters that relived you of your citizenship duties and gave you authority to found a new colony and rule it as a client of the mother city. No one was exempt from this law. Not even if you were a dragonlord. Dany's father actually had to go and get a writ appointing him Archon of Dragonstone before the Targaryens could leave the mother city with their dragons and their wealth.
The things that man did for his daughter.
Respect.
"That's all in order," the triarch said and handed the scroll case back to me before intoning formally. "I acknowledge you as acting under the authority of the Council of Magisters and your mission as under their aegis. Furthermore, as they have commanded, I will grant you all aid that is in my power to grant."
I bowed, "I am honored, noble triarch."
-+-
Two days after that meeting, the big day came, and I ended up in the fighting pit with my family, watching the action unfold from the seats placed well above the pit.
The fighting pits were something we were said to have adopted from the Ghiscari.
I was told by the architects I consulted that the fighting pits in the cities of Slavers bay were actual pits that had been dug into the earth and seats carved around their mouths. The ones copied by the Valyrians were built more in the style of roman arenas. It was a circular area that had been walled off and seats built in rising tiers so that it could accommodate tens of thousands of people. The area beneath the seats and the area underneath the floor of the fighting pit was a maze of animal pens, prisoner cells, armories, changing rooms and prop rooms.
It was a marvel of engineering that had been built to glorify ritual murder.
Being honored guests and carrying the personal invitation of the triarch, my family and I were given the prime seats in the triarch's stand. It was a front row viewing platform that was both raised and separated from the surrounding normal seats.
"This is magnificent!" Valaena exclaimed as she gripped my hand with an ear to ear grin on her face.
"I'm sure It'll be, sister," I agreed.
I had to raise my voice and all but should to talk to her, because the crowd surrounding us was screaming their heads off like the deranged fans at a rock concert.
This ruckus became even louder when the triarch stood up and raised a hand palm upwards, and a pair of slaves immediately took that as a signal to bang on a metal giant bronze gong with giant bronze hammers. The sound echoed throughout the fighting pit even over the screams of the crowd.
For an instant, the entire crowd fell silent.
Then the screaming began again, twice as loud.
A ten foot tall interior wall separated the floor of the fighting pit from the viewers seats, and the first row of seats were actually set upon the interior wall. I guessed that it was built that way to prevent the fighters and beasts in the pit from attempting to attack the audience. There were gates set along this interior wall at periodic intervals, some of them the height of a man, and others thrice the height of a man.
One of those larger gates now burst open, and a beast I had never seen before ran roaring into the fighting pit.
It looked like a giant crocodile that had evolved to live on land. It had long jaws set with rows of sharp teeth, four strong legs that lifted it's body a good four feet above the ground, and a long reptilian tail dragged along behind it as it moved. Muddy green scales covered it's entire body, looking for all the world as if it was wearing a suit of scale armor.
"What is that?" Valaena demanded as she bent forwards and stared with wide eyes. "I've never seen it before."
"It's a creature we call a forest drake," the triarch said from where he sat. "They live in the deep jungles and are hard to find and harder to catch. Even for us, this is a rare sight."
Even as he was speaking, the other fighter had entered the pit.
It was a man wearing only a loincloth and an open helmet, carrying a sword and a spear for weapons.
I made an educated guess that this was a slave.
The roar of the watching crowd became even louder.
If I had been in my old life and old body, this sight would have made me nauseous.
But now, after living in the freehold for twenty seven years, this really didn't bother me.
As the forest drake leaped on the slave to bite off his arm in a spray of blood and the screaming man ineffectually hacked at the beast with his sword, I felt only vaguely uncomfortable.
I guess Valyria really has changed me.
-+-
It was late when I finally got back to the manse, but I had one last task to do before I took to my bed.
I locked the doors of my room securely, and then went over to the large wooden writing desk that was in the room before bending down to unlock the steel bound wooden chest that was right next to it. From the assorted valuables inside, I retrieved a jet black dragonglass candle that was as long as my forearm and twisted around itself into a misshapen, ugly form.
I placed the candle upon the desk and reached out with the index finger on my right arm to touch the very top of the candle and pressed down so that the sharp edge of the artifact drew blood.
A moment later, the candle ignited with a small yellow flame that burned without any fuel.
I drew in a deep breath and focused.
With these candles, the sorcerers of Valyria could perform a number of arts, such as far speaking, far seeing, dream walking, and even future sight.
Normally, the archons and magisters employed specialized sorcerers for this task, with such sorcerers trained in special temples.
But I had gone out of my way to learn the art myself.
"Aerion? Is that you?"
And I wasn't the only one.
"Greetings, Daenys," I smiled as I cast the thought out, the candle carrying my mind's words across sea and land. "I'm pleasantly surprised to see you are at your candle. I was prepared to walk in your dreams."
"Do you remember what we were thought at the temple?" she cast back. "Always be at your candle at the final bell. If someone wishes to speak to you, they will do so then."
"I remember," I smiled. Those were the days. "I have to report to the mother city, but I'm glad I have this moment to speak with you. How goes your own voyage? We're in Gogossos now, resting and gathering supplies. From here we will be sailing into unknown lands."
"We're in Volantis," Dany cast back. Volantis, the first daughter of Valyria, and the largest city outside of the peninsula. "We too will go west soon. Our ships will sail along the coast and we will keep pace on dragon back. Father estimates that we will be sailing into Dragonstone in two months time if we go at a slow pace."
"Good," I sighed. "I myself can give no estimate as to when I will reach my destination. But hopefully. It will be less than a year."
"You will succeed," Dany assured me. "Do not give up hope! You will succeed and write your name into history! This, I have seen."
"That does give me hope," I smiled.
I was a fake prophet, with my knowledge of the future coming from an unusual source. Dany on the other hand, was the real thing. So her word meant a lot.
And I will take any advantage I can get.
-+-