You were bored. That was not an unusual thing to say about your life since you arrived in the Red Keep, and most in the Red Keep just left you alone because of it. You were, first and foremost, the protector of Daenerys Targaryen, her confidant and sword. In addition to your other duties as the Tutor to the Stark Girl for combat, and generally whatever Viserys wished you to be in any number of his… questionable ideas and the "Sidekick" to the Kingsguard, Particularly to Jaime Lannister, and Asher Forrester.
You remembered when he was drunk and thought it would be a good idea to dress you up as a whore, and try to follow that bastard Littlefinger to the ends of the earth. And you were not amused when Jaime offered to knight you.
You told him to go fuck himself if you thought you would go anywhere in Small clothes, esspecially to fuck someone she didn't want to fuck.
And it was that boredom that led you to the White Gold Tower.
To Jaime himself, and the rest of the Kingsguard, who were gathered for their morning assignments and briefings.
"Just because the king and princess are not in the city itself does not mean we can slack on our duties. The royal children are still in a state of danger, and there is also that killer that Prince Aegon is hunting down. We will offer our services to the Prince, and we will maintain a rotating guard of the Queen and her children."
You leaned against the door as Jaimie finished his briefing. "You know the snakes are more than capable of protecting Arianne right?"
Jaime forced a sigh, as the other kingsguard were… not happy with your appearance. "Even if we belive the Snakes are capable, we will still follow protocol. And orders from Ser Barristian."
Jaime than gave a small nod. "Arys, you are on Queen duty, Blackfish, you are helping the Prince. The rest of you, the day is yours until nightfall."
The men gave their nods as they walked out of the room. As the door closed, Jaime sighed. "Must you always act like we're back in the Villa, where nothing matters?"
"I'm pretty sure many things matter, Jaime, it's just that usually, Viserys is the one who made the plans. Not you." You replied.
"Well he is busy right now, at Dragonstone." You said.
That made you crack a smile. "Is everything alright?"
Jaime looked out the window. "No."
"Viserys try to talk to you, or have you been keeping it to yourself?"
"Aegon."
Oh, the Egg? He must have said something very profound.
"Beshka… do you have any regrets?" He asked.
"What the hells does-"
"Have you ever done anything you didn't want to do, or were forced to do?" Jaime asked.
That made you freeze, as you thought back to Mereen… to the Fighting pits. To the dead children that were killed by your hand while you struggled to survive.
But you gave a small laugh, trying to hide your conflict. "Not being able to fuck so many whores."
Jaime knew you were hiding your pain. But instead he nodded. "Very well." He was not pressing any further.
"What brings that up?" You asked.
"Just something I remembered a long time ago…"
You saw the White Book open to Jaimes' Page. With his deeds, his failures.
His triumphs. Ones he has written in himself.
"Now, Beshka, could you help me with something." He seemed to smile a little more, as if he realized something."
"What is it?" You asked.
"You'll see." He smiled.
-------------------------------------------------------------
The dress was horrible. You hated every moment you were in it.
It was made of red silks from Lys, and it was cut and made in a way that was… embarrassing. Your figure was not like Ariannes' which was voluptuous and form-fitting, which made the dress look beautiful.
You were more muscular, and with your mangled face… it made you look like a man wearing poor clothes.
Thank the Gods Asher could not see you. He would tease you forever.
"I didn't know Beshka could dress up like a lady?" Arianne said with a smile, as she bounced Aemon on her knee.
"I can if… persuaded." You growled as you glared at Jaime. He was going to die. You sure Viserys wouldn't mind his hand being murdered, he could always find another.
But that would be for another time.
You just had to endure court… at least you had Viserys gift strapped to your leg.
A chill grips you for a moment as you walk, but it is only a moment. You are the blood of the dragon, after all, and dragons are fire made blood and flesh; warmth lies in your veins, and the chill passes. You reach the end of the hall you've been walking down, and make your way to the spiralling stairs beyond. It is winter, and snow is gently falling outside the tower windows as you slowly descend past them. You've never seen snow before, and in this moment you're struck with wonder that anyone dreads the coming of winter; this is simply beautiful.
Wait. This isn't right. You know why people dread the winter. And you know this tower. The windows don't look this high up. Not for you.
Not right now, anyway.
That's when it clicks for you. You aren't in this tower, not really. You're on your ship, sailing for Dragonstone. And this is a dream. Well, you amend that thought, more a memory; you remember this tower and this winter. This is the last day of the Year of False Spring, and the snows will fall for another fortnight after this. And you are in this tower because you are following the man in front of you.
Rhaegar looks every inch the prince you remember. He's tall and handsome and dressed all in black, like always. But there's things you notice now that you didn't when you were a child; he looks terribly weighed down, nervous, stressed. His clothes are muted, sombre. His eyes are tight, lines already beginning to form around the edges.
You notice this last because he turns to look at you, something not quite like surprise in his face. "Following in my footsteps, my little prince?"
In a bittersweet way, you're glad to be in this moment with your adult self in your head; at the age of five, you hadn't cared for being called "little prince", least of all by the bigger one … but oh, what you wouldn't give to be irritated at hearing Rhaegar say 'little prince' in these days.
"I don't know the way," you hear yourself say. Strangely, you think you're hearing your adult voice instead of your pitchier and way more grating younger one. "Not all of it. You can show me, though," you add, trying not to sound too eager or hopeful.
Rhaegar's eyes twinkle like stars and he gives you a small smile, but he doesn't laugh. He almost never did, you realise. You don't even remember what his laugh sounded like.
"You can follow me a little while, but only a little." All too quick, his smile fades. "My path only goes a bit farther from here. And," he adds with some self-reproach, "you shouldn't follow me too far off of your own path anyhow."
You agree easily, just hoping to keep Rhaegar in your company a little while longer. You never had enough time with him in life, you'll do nothing to deprive yourself of it in your sleep.
It isn't long in walking with him before you break the silence.
"Do you know anything about what's ahead?"
He doesn't stop walking, but Rhaegar turns and looks down to you as he replies. "In here or in the waking world?"
You don't dare to hope, but … "Either?"
That small smile returns again. "I am dead, Viserys, not omniscient," he observes wryly. "I do know you're going somewhere important to us, in the waking world."
"Dragonstone, yes," you nod. "How did you know?"
Rhaegar absently fiddles with a pendant around his neck as he talks. "Dragonstone, the Doom, the foothills of the Red Mountains, a few other places in the world," he briefly glances out into the snowfall, "the borders are a bit thinner, more easily crossed. It's how I'm able to see you, interact with you now."
"Magical places?" You ask before you can even think about it.
He wiggles a hand. "In a sense." Again, his smile fades too fast for your liking. That said, it always did in life, too. "I suspect the God's Eye could be similar, as could some of the older godswoods in the North. But I would not easily bridge the divide there as I can near to home. And other places … Lorath, Valyria and Stygai could be called magical, but Hardhome, Chroyane, Carcosa, Yeen…" He trails off. "I would not dream to join what tries to cross in such a place."
You feel a chill again, but this is not one borne of the wind or the winter outside and your dragon's blood does nothing to fend it off. "Terrible things happened there," you observe.
Rhaegar's lips turn up, but you could not describe the face he makes as a smile, mirthless as it is. "You will find it remarkable how often those traits coincide."
"Terrible events and thinner borders?"
"And magical places," he adds. "Perhaps the maesters who feared magic were onto something."
You shake your head. "I don't believe that. I can't. There's magic in our blood," you point between the two of you as you reach the base of the stairs and descend into a darkened hallway.
He scoffs as he walks a bit more ahead of you now. "Is there any question that our blood has done terrible things?"
"Not you," you say, hoping that you don't sound as childish as you feel in the voicing of it.
Rhaegar stops in his place, and looks at you. He isn't any older than you are in the waking world in this memory, and he only lived two years past this, but the gaze he fixes onto you looks so much older and tired than you'd ever seen him. "You're old enough to know better than that, brother. Things that I did, things that I could have done, and the consequences spread out from thence … so much death lies at my feet that I could cross the Summer Sea and never find my ankles wet."
You don't really know what to say to that, so you fall back on your instinct. "You know, you were much more fun in life," you snipe as you step past him. The corridor continues down and at a curve, and it is dark but yet you can easily see where you're going.
Your legs at this age are little, though, hardly much bigger than the Imp's, and it takes Rhaegar no time at all to rejoin you.
"You aren't as young as you look," he retorts, but at least some of his mood has lifted from his tone. "You don't need me to shield you from the realities of things anymore."
There's only a little bitterness in your voice as you respond, "Would it kill you to try?"
"It literally did."
It's your turn to stop in place and stare. "That was almost a joke there, Rhaegar," and your head almost aches for a moment at the dissonance. "That was actually pretty good … for you, at least."
"Truly, I bask in the warmth of your praise," the dead prince says flatly before turning his head back to the way ahead of you both. He takes a few more steps, then stops.
A moment later, you join him and see why. The corridor has ended, and before you sits a stone chamber with three doors, at slight angles off each other, set into the wall opposite you. The unreality of your dreamscape becomes a bit more obvious than bantering with Rhaegar had made it as you look at these doors. Themselves, the doors are a solid wood, nothing remarkable about any one of them over the next. The archways they are set into, however … one blazes with fire in a half-ring around its door, yet the wood does not catch and no heat comes from that direction; one is radiant, as though it were constructed of light itself, and it hurts your eyes to look directly at it; and one is cloaked in shadow, without discernible features beyond a basic archway, and you can barely see the door within for the darkness of the shadow.
You glance over to your brother. "Which way?"
Rhaegar's face clouds. "I have no memory of this place." Then he turns your way. "I think this is where my path ends and yours continues."
You look at the three doorways before you, studies in contrast all of them. You'll need to go through one if your path is to continue.
"How do I choose?" For the first time here, your voice sounds as small as you.
He shrugs. "I wish I had answers for you, little prince." Rhaegar always looked dolorous, as you recall, but this is the first time you think you've really seen regret on his face. "I wish for many things: that my path hadn't faltered and stopped here; that you were not burdened to take it up; that our lands did not suffer and burn for the actions of our blood…" He shakes his head. "And if wishes were dragons, we could conquer the Seven Kingdoms anew."
"I don't want to choose the wrong one." You hate how little your voice sounds now, but you can't help it.
"Is that…" Rhaegar trails off for a moment before he scoffs a little chuckle out. "I see. You fear choosing the wrong door because you think it's likewise choosing the wrong path."
You cock your head. "Isn't it?"
"No." He gestures ahead of you. "Your path is your own, and your path is an unending line of choices, not one single choice here and now. This," he looks at the doorways now, "I think, is more about a peek at what comes next. Maybe you'll regret picking one over the others, but I think there's no wrong door here."
"You think so?"
He chuckles a little more, still not a laugh, but closer to it than you remember hearing in life. "I've been alive a bit longer than you, and dead longer still. If one of us is going to be the expert on strange dreams, don't you think it's likely to be me?"
You can't fault the logic in that. But then again, it's a dream; logic isn't the name of the game. "So you think it's less of going to one room, one path," you try, "and more picking a door to glance behind as I'm going?"
He nods. "Sounds about right." You take one step forward, and begin to take a second, but he speaks again. "That having been said, I could be wrong. It wouldn't be the first time," he adds ruefully.
You fix him with what you hope is your best waspish look. "Truly, you are a font of knowledge and confidence," you drawl out.
He shrugs again. "It's your dream, little prince; not my fault if I'm unhelpful within it."
He could pretend to feel a little bad about it, though, you think. "Maybe what's beyond these doors will be more helpful."
"Not in my experience," he retorts as he begins to circle to your side, just behind you, "but by all means, prove me wrong." Rhaegar gives you a warm smile then. "Nothing makes me more proud of you than seeing that happen."
Your own retort dies unspoken on your lips. The sensation you feel is odd, as though you'd swallowed something too large for your throat and now it was stuck. Your eyes prickle a little as you look straight ahead.
He touches your shoulder then, just outside of your sight. "Go ahead without me, brother. You don't need me with you."
Whatever was stuck in your throat seems to have passed, because you start to say with a ragged voice, "That will never be true, Rhaegar, I…" but as you turn his way the rest of the words die beside the others at your lips, because he's gone. Your first impulse is to go looking for him, but while your eyes move around the room, your feet never move, because in your heart you know you would not find him.
You rub at your eyes for a moment, and try to clear the remains of whatever was lodged in your throat. Then you look once more to the three doors, facing different angles, before you. You wonder which one to open.
[ ] A doorway blazing with fire
[ ] A doorway cloaked in shadow
[ ] A doorway radiant with light
I will confess that I suspect the exchange Rhaegar has with you, about this being merely peeking behind one of these doors rather than the choice dominating your destiny, is perhaps more than a bit meta and heavy-handed, but I wanted to make as clear as possible that this is not a choice that determines the rest of Viserys' life -- to cross the threshold into meta territory completely, this is basically allowing you the choice of a peek behind the QM curtain, and the choice made will determine what you get to see. There's no wrong choice here.
A wall of heat practically smacks you in the face, as though all the heat that you should have been feeling from the doorway but weren't had decided to show up all at once, en masse. It is oppressively hot, and the air is thick with smoke in this ramshackle room you have found yourself in. Furniture barely deserving of the name is ablaze as though doused in oil beforehand. Casks of unopened wine burst nearby from the heat and resulting pressure. Crates of foodstuffs are cooking on the ground, untouched by human hands. The hells with this, you think, and turn back.
There is no doorway behind you.
Cursing aloud, you see you have no way out but through.
One crate near your feet falls open, and you see snakes and squid squirm in discomfort and alarm as they try to find safe haven from the heat. You try not to step on them as you move, but it is tough to do and in looking at the ground you aren't looking around you near enough; your head strikes against an ornate lamp of gilded metal and scarlet glass that really hurts on impact, and the resulting dizziness forces you to lean against a wall. Well, you intend to lean against it. What ends up happening is somewhat less pleasant.
Crashing through that wall, you fall to the ground in the next room, but it is not a hard landing. You hit something soft and warm, sticky to the touch, and when you push up form it you see it once was a person, mercifully dead as it has been savaged into unrecognition by something other than the fires around you. The length of hair as it begins to catch, curl, and smoke, and some remnant of curvature to the carcass, makes you certain this was once a woman. The smell of burning hair hits you then, and it redoubles your drive to get out, anywhere but here.
You pick a wall at random, hoping this one leads outside, and you ram yourself into it with all your might. Maybe its your intent that makes the difference here, but you succeed, and find yourself exiting through an exterior wall, covered in soot and grime and stickiness that you really hope is just blood, all of which makes the dust from the wall cling to you and make you look like some sort of ghost.
The air outside of the building, somehow, is even thicker with smoke, and has a confusingly brackish taste to it. Stumbling through the wreckage of other buildings and barely avoiding a fall from the uprooted cobblestone beneath your feet, you find yourself to be constantly bombarded with senses you cannot explain or understand. You can hear screams but cannot locate any source, you can see flames but not what is being burned, and then you feel more than you hear terrible roars birthed of no human or animal you've ever known.
Almost by accident, you've gotten closer to the sources of the flames, and part of you wishes you had not.
You saw nothing burning because the flames come not from wood or coal but from the mouths of dragons. Red and white, they are dragons you have never seen before, yet there is a sense of kinship you feel nonetheless. They circle round and round and claw and slash and roar and breathe fire, but not at each other; their breath lays out what you thought to be air impossibly thick with smoke to be air impossibly thick with smoke and something else.
You see a shadowy not-cloud that chokes the air itself, writhing with an inky blackness that makes your stomach roil. The dragons flap their wings heavily, and some of the shadow is forced away from what it was hiding. That part of you that wishes you had not gotten closer grows considerably. Wearing the smoke and shadow like a cloak, you see an enormous thing with tentacles of blackest night snatching at the dragons, while more tentacles are grabbing at smaller things that it shoves into its sides.
No, not sides. You see teeth.
Not sides, mouths. Dozens and dozens of gnashing, slime-dripping mouths, all at wrong angles and moving and oh seven hells the mouths move around its body, you realise. If this was the real world, you'd surely throw up now … which, it looks like some of the mouths are doing.
Until, against your will, your eyes look closer, as if your gaze was dragged there by a will stronger than your own.
Some mouths are not throwing up … exactly … but are unquestionably spewing things forth. Tiny things. Hundreds of them. Small monstrosities, wriggling and screaming abominations that are scooped up by other black tentacles and shoved back into different mouths from whence they came, a few crawling away and disappearing from your sight.
This horror twists about in the shadow and the flame, stumbling around on short, shaggy, writhing legs, far too many of them and every last one coming to two wretched clawing ends that paw at the ground and kick pointlessly into the air. Around you, without seeing a source or recognising a voice, you begin to hear something being repeated. It continues to repeat, and more sourceless voices join in, until it is a roar to match the dragons and the screams and the sounds escaping the horror in darkness.
"Eeeee aahhhh, eeeee aahhhh," you can make out, then other sounds that are no language you've ever heard before and hope never to again. And then, because your mind wasn't being driven spare from the wrongness enough yet, you hear High Valyrian. It is hard to hear it over the din, but you pick up some bits.
"Ee aa, ee aa, va mōriot rijībiā bē, Āeksio Guēsin…"
"Zōbrī Hobres se Pyrys Talar!"
"Imāzissis jikās sēterys vali, laodiapos se mīsītsor ruarzan…"
You hear much more human screams, quickly and with a clear direction this time, and you instinctively look up to see a man in the clutches of one such dread tentacle. Then two, three, seven tentacles all grab on too, and they go to work. Some of them bludgeon the man, some pull and tear, ripping an arm off and showering the dragons (and you, anew) in red blood that burns as it touches. You cannot look away, even as you try. Your will isn't feeling like it's fully your own anymore, and that's not something you're comfortable with.
A cry of an entirely different nature is what pulls your gaze away from the mind-rending sight, and causes a different kind of recoil altogether. A massive raven has landed on your shoulder, and it squawks again before it goes rooting around in your hair. You move quickly to shoo it away, but it moves faster and pulls something out of your hair, and you get a brief glance of oh, that looks like a bit of person from up there before it gobbles the tidbit down.
"Sorry," it says to you, "it was very distracting."
You blink. "Don't mention it." Outside of your field of vision, the fires still rage and the monsters clash, but it's all muted, as if in another room or across a large field. The raven seems to be pulling your focus, and you think you might possibly be grateful for that.
"This isn't normally your sort of thing," it remarks idly. "What brings you here?"
"You're right, feasts and shenanigans are more my taste," you decide to play along. Looking at, and talking to, this raven is definitely less sanity-damaging than what you were looking at before. "I followed my brother here."
"Seven above, you don't want to do that," the raven says. You look closer and see it has three eyes. Even with that, and the coherent conversation, it's still not the weirdest thing you've seen this night. "Following Rhaegar would be a terrible mistake for you."
You give the bird a long look. "Funny, he told me something similar."
"He was always possessed of moments of insight," the raven answers, as if it knew him well. "In between fortnights of gloomy boneheadedness."
...okay, perhaps it did know him well.
The raven cocks its head. For something so very obviously much more than a raven, it is rather insistent on bird-like behaviours. "Unlike your brother and sister, you're not experienced in things like this, so I'll offer you some help, little prince." It feels a little weird, to be called that by a raven, but you think you'll allow it. " What you see here is only a possibility, and unhelpfully allegorical, to my eye. What you see here may influence your life, may happen differently, may not even happen at all ... but your destiny lies along a different path from those you see here. Pay attention to it, learn from it ... but do not trust in it, and do not try to plan around it."
"Was that Rhaegar's flaw?" You cannot help but ask.
"The first was. The second," those three eyes look into your two, and it feels like they see far beyond that, "is yours. Keep your wits about you, boy, and don't get to thinking you can outsmart destiny."
You chew at your tongue for a moment. "I'll do my best. Thank you."
"Before I go, boy, one other thing you should hear," the bird says, ruffling its feathers at you. "The first will be important to you always, but this one is a bit more immediate."
"And that is?"
"Be careful who you trust." And it picks another bit of person out of your hair, some blood dripping onto your cheek.
When you wake, for a moment you swear your face feels wet.
Well.
That was an experience.
It turns out that whatever that was, dream or vision, it kept you asleep for most of the morning. You'll break your fast late, and you'll … well, come to that, what will you do?
[ ] "Mornings are for coffee and contemplation." Historically you do your best thinking on your own (okay, and your most reckless, too, but even that usually works our in your favour). And, you want to take that talking raven's words, about being careful who you trust, to heart. You'll puzzle over things and chew on this, and your bacon, alone. [ ] "I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." You have made a habit of surrounding yourself with the best and the brightest (and Asher) and any one of them on the ship with you could offer insights and perspective you would not find on your own. [Pick 1-3 of the options below, listed in order of likelihood you would trust them with this.]
-[ ] Dany
-[ ] Oberyn
-[ ] Jacaerys
-[ ] Barristan
-[ ] Asher
-[ ] Willas -[ ] Allard gods, why would you do that?
AN:
Tell me what you wanna do; eat alone and contemplate, talk with your sister about what you experienced, talk with Oberyn about cunning schemes and snakewood, distract yourself with petty torments of Willas Tyrell, go fly with Ebrion … let's see what you come up with, and what you can convince the rest of collective to sign up for.
Edited the vote to offer a little more guidance, leave things less open-ended (which, I admit, will also make it easier to plan a little ahead)
Oh, and I welcome speculation about what you've seen and heard. [twirls fingers maniacally whilst perfecting Palpatine Cackle™]
Credit must be given in no small part to @Vocalist -- the idea of conveying information and dangling some plot-hooks via dreams and visions isn't new, but I learned from one of the best ... and also, her raven (from, wow, actually three years ago almost to the day in her ASOIAF quest) intruded onto this scene entirely outside of my plans for the chapter* and once that happened, every time I tried to finish this without him it felt incomplete.
*yes, some of the advice to Viserys is metatextual and also directed at myself; I like it when there's multiple layers to a thing.
You took a deep breath as the man in front of you awoke, his nacked body covered in burns and sand. "Good, good. You finally awaken after such a fucking long time. I was wondering if I had killed you, but the poison that knocked you out was… not strong enough for that. Unfortunately for you."
The servant who had, once upon a time, cared for an aging Ser Willem and the young Targaryen Children was much older than the description you had heard once from the young prince… now king. His hair was grey, his face covered in cuts and bruises and welts. Stab scars from fights and battles adorned his body. Not of war, but of tavern fights and brawls.
"What do you want?" The man said in broken common. He was terrified of you, after all, you know held his life in your hands.
Out here at the edge of the Bravoosi Coast, of rocks and sand… and the smoke beyond even further, behind him to his east. Alexander and his crusade had passed through Vas Dorthrak a moon ago… And it was still burning.
"I want lots of things. My wife, for one thing, the one thing in my life that gave me joy, that was cruelly taken away from me by men like you. Greedy men who could not do anything hard, and took the easy way out. The same men who killed her were like you. Servents who had no honor. No loyalty… no dignity in the end."
You were going to unleash a hail of a monologue, describing the horror you would inflict on him by leaving him to die.
But you needed to keep this… focused. Viserys wanted revenge. Not you. You needed to make sure that he learned that.
"My master… a master you once served, wanted to repay you for your disloyalty." You took great pleasure as the servant's face morphed, first to confusion, then to recognition.
"That dragon cunt!? He still lives!?" He was horrified, stepping back, falling backward as you pulled out Viserys… mark. A mark you were sure this… fool would remember, from the embroidered clothes he saw with them.
"Yes… and he seeks to make his vengeance known." You threw over a bag… meat bag, like the one Viserys stole on that fateful night. "There is a week of meat in there… along with two rings and The Seven-Pointed Star.
You saw the horror on his face, before throwing over a vial. It was a vial of… well, Oberyn didn't say, it was a vial that he assured you was the most deadly poison in his stock.
Well, second-deadliest poison. A blasted fool only ever gave the best to the King. A Good one would allow his most trusted thief to have it.
"That is a poison that will kill you in about three heartbeats." You said as you walked towards your waiting horse.
You then mounted it. "I give you two days before you contemplate drinking it."
"Where did you take me!" the man demanded.
"Death." You replied with a single word, and you then rode away.
Maybe he would be clever like Viserys. Maybe…
But you held little hope for this man. He was a traitor.
Meanwhile At Home: A Simple Chat of a Serious Nature
(Arianne POV)
You sighed and felt a weariness in your heart that you had not felt in a long time, an emptiness that had been too long consumed by the passion and love for your beloved husband. It was like a dream that you had been having for such a long time, not quietly coming to an end as the reality came fully crashing down, and the weight of your choices realized.
Like your two children keeping you up at night while Viserys was away and you are desperately trying to deal with the both of them before you stumble to exhaustion.
How you wished your uncle was here, he was always such a treat to have when it came to handling children, his skills and advice on handling your… hellions of twins were enough to save you and your husband many a night of lost sleep.
But on the other hand, with your uncle off on another adventure, this time with your foolish and daring husband dragging him along, you had to deal with the… still helpful but not as experienced Sand Snakes.
A blessing and a curse.
A Blessing, that you also did not need to keep a full time babysitter and wet nurse around to care for the two infants, and you could keep your family close in raising the twins.
The curse… was… well… the past. Obara, Tyene, and their sisters had… Well, they taught you things about yourself a long time ago, when you became a beautiful young woman that many call Elia come again.
In that time, when your father and uncle planned and adventured or ruled, when you were not training to become the princess of Dorne or the future Queen of the Seven kingdoms…
They taught you about sex. Particularly foreplay, how to pleasure a man or a woman with your mouth, your movements, and… everything at your disposal.
Obara related it to a weapon. Your body, every curve, every freckle, every eyelash was a weapon to ensnare a man and get him to do what you wish. Seduction is at its most basic form a physical ensnarement, with your body as the trap.
That was how they viewed it anyway. Oberyn had taught them that way to protect them from… the unsavory sort. Even when they learned weapons and skills. He viewed sex as power, a weapon to protect themselves, like any other blade.
You of course viewed it differently. A man, especially Viserys was not interested in physical beauty. He was interested in the mind, the conversation, the wit, even the way you stood. In many ways, you fell head over heels for him when he waltzed into that Palace in Volantis, scarred from battle, the swagger in his step, even the way he calmly spoke.
How he danced… how he kissed you, how surprised he was when you decided to do a little trick that those-
You were getting ahead of yourself.
Thankfully, Tyene was the only one who had been excited to be your assistant to the royal duo that were your children and had finally placed Aemon into his crib, next to his sister when you finally spoke. "Tyene." She turned to face you, eyes curious. "Thank you for coming."
"I live to serve my queen?" She said with a small tilt of her head. "Besides, I love to see my little niece and nephew."
Memories flooded back, of a time before Tyene went to help her stepmother… Eliria with raising the four youngest of Oberyn's daughters, and acting as an informant to her father in Oberyn's whereabouts. "Do you remember when we were little, and the Water Gardens were so full of life in our youth when were?"
Tyene smiled the memory coming back to her, a smile on her face. "I remember. I remember you stole dye and tried to make my hair black as yours? So we could switch places when you didn't want to meet one of your Father's Bannermen? Vaith was it?"
"No Jourdan." You replied. "How we stole the wine and rode to Plankytown, hid in the brothel." Your face turned a shade of scarlet. How dare your emotions to act so carelessly. "Wondered aloud if we'd meet another one of your father's daughters?"
That earned a laugh. "Not in Plankytown I fear… you know how uncle is about Oberyn's ways so close to home. There would have been more scandal than he could bear."
You shook your head. "Oberyn wouldn't care. He would just be happy, and care for her as he did with every one of your sisters."
Tyene snorted and laughed. "I seem to remember we drank the wine and kissed? Or am I misremembering?"
You both did more than kiss. By the gods, what didn't you two did that night? Her sisters teased you relentlessly… but never told your father about the escapade. Even though he had… knowing looks.
"We got back and pretended to be at the Water Gardens for than entire evening." You said with a smile.
You needed to be forthright with her. Being honest was always the policy you had in the bed-chamber, even with Viserys never… being completely honest with his feelings. Or his thoughts… or troubles.
And you were safe… Gods you were safe, your children were safe. Your family was all safe and avenged. You just wished he could talk to you like he had those nights, without any pressure or weight of the world seemingly on his shoulders!
But another time you would talk to him. Now was the time for something happy to occur… or at least think about.
"Tyene… There is something important I want to tell you." You stated, seriously, and firmly as befitting a queen of the Seven Kingdoms.
Tyene's eyes slowly became like her father's, narrowed like a vipers, caught entirely into your gaze. "What is it?" She replied, before looking to the walls, trying to hear if any of her sisters were listening.
"Would you like to join Viserys and I in bed?" You asked, taking any formality out of the statement.
"What?" She seemed confused at the statement. Completely and utterly. "I? Arianne, what has brought this on?"
Secrets mostly. And your seeming inability to make Viserys relax To see what truly was making him feel more distant… not physically, but emotionally. Ever since he planned that trip back to Dragonstone. "It is not what you think… It's more personal than that."
"Is there a problem?" She asked.
More than you know. But you kept those thoughts to yourself. "I fear as though Viserys is…" The thoughts were there, the words were not.
But it might be best to stretch the truth. "We are just wishing to spice up the bed-chamber activities so to speak. Viserys has always been… exotic in the way he conducts royal business." The euphemism was not lost on Tyene who just crocked an eyebrow. "He's used to… tricks, flexibility."
"Whores." She stated without hesitation. "Viserys is used to unmarried women, or whores when he fucks then?"
Blunt as always. "Yes, He has only slept with Whores, sex slaves, or unmarried women. He doesn't feel comfortable… or rather, he is far too comfortable."
"Whatever do you mean?" Tyene was now understanding. "Is this really about Viserys, or is it about you and how comfortable you are with him?"
You took a deep breath and shook your head. "Is it wrong that I don't fully trust him, even after all this time, and all he has given me, and I, him, in bed? Even though I love him."
"Have you tried talking to him?" your cousin replied. "That could help?"
"I haven't had the time?" YOu replied. "He never seems to have the time either. The Realm weighs heavily upon his shoulders.
"Make the time, and if you still don't feel comfortable, do not hesitate to ask," Tyene replied, giving you a hug, unprompted. "We'll all be there to help you. And maybe then, it won't be necessary."
I have removed all the sexy subtext and just went straight for the emotions.
edit: I would think that, due to Viserys... moods and his sometimes inability to be open and honest with his feelings, especially to those he loves, he sometimes keeps secrets.
and with him being in a very... precarious position, in realm standing, financial and political power, he'd be under a bit of pressure.
And also, I think that would happen, considering how the two fell in love, and... well got married in less then three months. Perhaps all the lingering issues got sidelined for politics.
You looked at the great maps of the known world and tried your best to fathom it. These maps were old, dating back to the Sea Snakes Voyages themselves, drawn by the Great Navigator during his many missions and adventures across the known World, From Westeros' great Northern Lands Beyond the Wall, to the Smoking Sea's Edges… To Yi Ti itself.
Those voyages had made House Valyreon one of the richest and most powerful families in all of Westeros, and one of the most prestigious houses worth the name.
But that was the greatest accomplishment in the last 200 years that your family had taken part in. Yes there were Dragon Riders in the Dance. But they were all dead. And with the Dance, so were any chances of continued Success from great Voyages of discovery, trade and profit.
The Sea Snake was Dead. And while there was continued progress with the Oakenfist during the conquest of Dorne, and the Blackfyre rebellions. No Valyreon would ever rise to such heights again. Never in wealth, power, control of the seas.
House Valyreon, for a lack of a better word, was forgotten, her time in the sun brief, and bright, but it dimmed just the same.
But for you, you desired more. Not a crown, you did not wish to sail to the step stones with a hired fleet and become a Pirate King, as you once joked with Viserys and Alyn that you would do when Alyn was of age to take care of Monterys. You had another dream.
A Dream to make your ancestors of the Sea Proud.
The Sea Snake was many things, an able seaman, a hero, a merchant and adventurer without peer. But you were one person that he wasn't. A Bastard with a chip on his shoulder, willing to risk it all in a few, desperate, insane gambles for fun, and profit.
You had been planning to recreate some of his voyages. Taking a fleet of ships that were still in Driftmark that were owned by your family that survived the Screams, the wars, and would not be missed by Lords Stannis and Harrlow. You had plenty of those in spades, and with crews that remembered their rescue and command during those dark days before you met Viserys and paid him Homage.
They would follow you into the Doom with a smile on their face, you were certain of that.
But it would require one more thing.
One thing you loathed to do, after so much… horror.
Alyn. "You can't leave." He said.
"I'm not leaving yet, but when you are of age." You replied. "You can be Lord Protector for Monterys, and you will be a far better one than I." You were trying your very best to not sound like doing this hurt you. Alyn was many things. But a fool who would listen to his elders was not one of them, even when it was you, the only brother he ever had. "The Lord's of Westeros respect trueblood, and true born, not basterds." You paused. "Not me."
"They respect you. You have the King's ear, and he adores your wit more than the flattery and the prancing that the other nobles lack." Alyn replied as he folded his arms. "They don't respect me."
"They will." You replied.
"Not like you." He replied.
Alyn… he was really living up to his name's sake. "You see these maps?" You asked.
"Yes, and they don't matter." Alyn replied. "Chasing past glories won't father back. It won't bring anyone back." He paused, and realized what he was saying. "I don't want to lose anyone else." Illic purple eyes looked back. "Especially you."
How you wished you didn't have a heart for your younger brother and cousin. Where you didn't care and didn't need to care for them.
It was quiet for a moment, before you realized Alyn was hugging you. "Don't make plans to leave when we still need you."
You made him let go and crouched down to his height. "I wouldn't leave if I thought you couldn't handle it. You are far stronger than I am Alyn… you just need to realize it. And take that chance so you can protect Monterys...and be a man. Find someone you love. Protect our family. I have done that. Now it's your turn."
Tears streamed down his face. "I'm not ready."
"You will be." You replied with a smile. "Not yet, but soon."
You would stay, you wouldn't leave them when they were both still so young, even if they were not naive to the world and it's horrors and genocide. But with news that King was coming to Dragonstone, you could see if he would agree to your plans.
After all, the King had ambitions and interests in the East. He may need a skilled Captain.
And you had his ear… however faint it is.
You may be a Water, but you were also a Sea Dragon. Your heart belonged to the Sea.
AN: hey @Marlowe310811 I have finally gotten that new Omake I told you about.
This quite evidently fought with me for some time, only getting bits and pieces done over weeks, rather than entire scenes in a few days, like I'm used to. I don't care for it. Apparently the muse is holding out for higher wages and healthcare. Which it obviously deserves.
[X] "I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." You have made a habit of surrounding yourself with the best and the brightest (and Asher) and any one of them on the ship with you could offer insights and perspective you would not find on your own. [Pick 1-3 of the options below, listed in order of likelihood you would trust them with this.]
-[X] Dany
-[X] Oberyn
You finish relating the details of your strange dream to your sister and goodbrother. Ever the soul of honesty in your presence, Dany does nothing to disguise her discomfort or concern. For his part, Oberyn seems pensive, carefully looking into his cup of wine, as if an answer is to be found there. If you didn't know him as well as you do, you'd miss the tightening of muscles along his jaw and the shadow that falls over his eyes. It occurs to you, then, that you might not be the first Targaryen to talk about troubling dreams with him, and that it might be an unpleasant reminder of times past.
Doing your best to move past it, you chew on a bit of food before speaking again. "Have either of you insights you care to offer? Further questions about what I remember?" You pause. "…witty remarks that I can steal and later pass off as my own?"
The gambit works, as Oberyn lets slip an undignified snort, and his melancholy is interrupted. "The amount of work it would take to craft any gift of wit I offered you into something that could pass for your own words, Viserys," he sets his cup down, having not pulled from it, "you may as well think them up yourself in the first place."
"Quite right," you agree. "Why struggle to polish up a Dornish wit when my own would surely suffice?"
The Master of Whispers, feeling perhaps too cozy in a room that is just you and your sister, offers a brazenly rude gesture without even looking your way.
"Are there any houses besides ours," Dany begins, apparently tiring of her elders' shenanigans, "lesser or extinct, that feature dragons besides the Blackfyres?"
"The Houses Vance in the Riverlands," you offer, "one green, one black, for who their branch backed in the Dance. Toland has a green dragon, as well."
Oberyn scratches at his chin in thought. "The Willums have a dragonbone skeleton in their arms. If you count wyverns in the mix, House Vyrwel has a silver one."
Dany's eyes pass between you both. "None with a white dragon?"
There are none that you can recall, but as you're about to say this, Oberyn draws a sharp breath. "One did." He reaches for his cup. "The Bloodraven used a white dragon as his personal arms."
Your sister fixes him with a sceptical look. "Brynden Rivers was already an old man when he went North with Uncle Aemon, and he died somewhere beyond the Wall long before our grandfather was king, Oberyn. I don't think he's a good candidate for the white dragon Viserys saw."
Oberyn doesn't flinch. "If there were any man for whom I would need to see the body before me, cold and unmoving, in order to comfortably say he's dead, it would be him." He takes a long drink before he speaks again. "Mother would tell us stories about him; that he was rumoured to be a powerful dark sorcerer, that he and his paramour Shiera Seastar could listen through the ears of a pitcher to hear your softest whispers, that he could change his face like his clothes and slip into carrion crows to steal secrets from the dead. I know," he waves his hand, "I know, better than most given my position, that rumours are wild and untrustworthy things. But if even a single grain of truth resided in those rumours…" He visibly shivers. "I thank the Seven that the Usurper never had a man like that at his side."
It would have been such a welcome challenge, though, you wistfully think to yourself. What you say aloud is, "Even if they were both powerful sorcerers, they both are long since dead."
Your Master of Whispers bobs his head left and right, neither concession nor challenge. "Maybe so. But can we say for certain that the white dragon doesn't linger still?"
You can't help the confused frown that creeps across your brow. "They never had any children."
"That they announced or acknowledged," Oberyn retorts. "But they would know intimately how much chaos bastards of the royal blood could cause, the sword that hangs over the head of a Targaryen bastard from birth. Bloodraven especially; he killed Seven only know how many of them 'for the good of the realm'. If they had any offspring, it's a sure bet they would not have made it widely known, if anyone knew at all."
…now that's a thought that will fester.
"Did you recognise anything of where you were?" Dany asks, moving on. "Any hints of familiarity?"
You begin to shake your head, but pause. "…I didn't recognise anything, exactly. But there was something familiar about the place, inside and out." You shrug. "In my defense, I was a bit distracted by the dead and the dying and the chanting voices I couldn't see."
"Were they anything you recognised?" Oberyn asks.
This time you do shake your head. "One was disfigured beyond recognition save once being a woman, and the other was too far away and killed too quickly for me to catch anything."
He gives a small, mirthless laugh. "Your forgiveness, Your Grace, I didn't mean the bodies. I meant the voices, the words you heard. Did you catch any of them?"
"A couple, none that made any sense." You repeat the phrases you heard, and you're sure you don't imagine the shudders both your companions experience as you speak.
The Master of Whispers looks a bit sheepish as he says, "I confess my High Valyrian is weakest of the tongues I speak. Did you understand what was being said, well enough to put it in Common?"
"The first was hard to hear, but the last one I heard the clearest. What they first said was something like, 'Praises ever to the Wood Lord'. I think." Again, a shrug escapes you. "There was a lot going on."
Oberyn scratches at his head a moment. "Something in that feels familiar, but I cannot put a name to it now. With your pardon, I'll think on it," he taps at his temple with a wry smile, "try to see if something shakes loose from these aging brains over the next two days."
"Of course."
Dany shuffles in her seat a bit, then leans forward. "What did you hear the clearest?" She probes.
"And He shall put on the shape of men," you recite, "the mask and the clothes that conceal."
You tell yourself the cold chill that crawls across your shoulders is just your imagination, your unpaid due for your restless night. And you deliberately ignore the sharp look that Dany gives you as your gaze returns to Oberyn.
"That sounds rather like the House of Black and White, doesn't it?" You ask him.
He nods, but doesn't look convinced. "It sounds like deception, yes, but not that which is performed by humans … more like something pretending to be human. Something that wouldn't look it without concealment. That doesn't sound like the Faceless Men to me."
"It would take more than a mask and clothes to disguise the thing I saw as human," you say, "but if you think the Faceless Men are an unlikely candidate, by all means scratch them from the list of plausible suspects."
Oberyn's mouth twists. "It would be a mistake to discount them altogether, I think … but moving them to the bottom, that I would be comfortable with." A thought seems to pass through his mind at that moment, as his attention shifts. "With your permission, I would send a raven to my eldest daughters. Not of any particulars, but general guidance."
You arch an eyebrow, but nod your permission.
Dany is less silent about her uncertainty. "Why would they need to hear from you so soon after leaving, if not about those particulars?"
It's subtle, but you see what looks like some colour flee from Oberyn's cheeks as he explains, "Because they grew up with Asha Greyjoy, and if there's any reason to suspect snakes and squid could be in some coming peril…"
"I see."
You give him another nod. "Do think on that passing sense of the familiar from before, as well. But after writing them."
"I shall. If there is nothing else Your Grace desires to share or requires of me?" Oberyn says, clearly a formality as he is already rising to his feet. You feel eyes other than his settle onto you.
"Nothing else," you echo as you keep your focus on him. He nods to you, and is out the door in moments.
You let out a small sigh, embrace the inevitable, and turn to meet Dany's iron gaze.
"Something vexes you?" You ask mildly.
"You didn't translate the middle phrase for him."
No, you did not. "I thought if he didn't catch it right off, better not to worry him. He's already paranoid enough that he imagines Bloodraven crossing the divide and intruding on our lives, the last thing he needed to hear was praise given to 'The Black Beast with a Thousand Children'," you say. There's no reason to delude yourself about the reasons for this shudder when it passes up your spine; there's precious few metaphorical black beasts you can think of beyond your lost relatives in House Blackfyre … and a Thousand Children from them would truly deserve to be the stuff of nightmares. Yes, you'd watched the beast consume them almost as fast as they spawned, an apt metaphor for the cursed line if ever there was one, but plenty more slipped away beyond your vision.
"Your Grace's pardon," and there isn't even so much as the pretense of earnestness in her voice as she asks for it, "but I understood it to be Oberyn's job to worry."
Her smile slides a little as you stare evenly back at her. You know she isn't trying to rouse your ire, and you know she's fast becoming one of the smartest people in Westeros, but intent has a troubled relationship with result, and there remains plenty she does not know, or instinctively think of.
And that's the thing, here. She doesn't know. You let out a long, slow sigh. "You've only heard stories, things whispered when people think we can't hear, or dragged out of those who would rather forget. Even I don't know everything about this --" and you falter when her composure slips and her eyebrows do their best to climb into her hair. "Yes, I can say those words, and mean them, too," you give her a wry grin, "try not to die of shock."
Dany smiles back, and she relaxes a little even as the unintended levity of the moment fades and you continue. "Our mother and brother did their best to keep me above it, but you might as well try to hold back the Blackwater with only your hands." The memories are few, hazy and unfocused, but you still saw it. "I have some small idea of what happens when a king and a spymaster feed one another's paranoia," and you can see the moment comprehension dawns on her. "It's a mistake I won't repeat."
"You can't let the things that happened before I was born," and how had you never noticed before her mmanner of talking around your father's name, even the word itself? you wonder, "influence how you act now."
You shake your head. "How can I not? The Great Houses, the Small Council, the Faith and the Citadel all remember those days. If I start to jump at shadows and send the Master of Whispers looking for traitors, real or imagined, how fast will they start to expect burnings and worse to follow? No," you frown, "I'll need grounds more relative than one cryptic dream before I even chance opening that door."
Dany gives you a slow nod. "I can't claim to agree with your decision, but I do understand it."
You appreciate that, and say in turn, "While it will still inform my thoughts and actions for some time, I understand your point that I should not forever be paralysed by the past." A thought occurs to you. "It could be that what I saw was the past, you know. A red dragon and a white one, doing battle with a black beast spawning wildly while the world around them burns."
"Do you truly believe that, brother," Dany says, with the dangerous combination of a warm and compassionate voice and a piercing gaze of unyielding force that you find oddly familiar, "or do you wish you believed that?"
It's a rare experience for you, to open your mouth only to find nothing will leave it. You close it, giving her only a very small, impotent scowl.
Dany is nothing if not graceful in her little victories; she doesn't make you say it aloud, though she clearly can read from your face that you concede the point. She sighs, takes Oberyn's cup, and finishes what's in it before she pours a bit more for herself and for you. "I think we can talk of other things for now, unless there remains something you wanted to focus on?"
There's a tickle at the back of your head, like there should be something occurring to you. The best you can come up with is, "You'd rather spend time with me than Willas?"
The smile Dany gives you is one that would not look out of place on Arianne or one of her cousins. "There's a Dornish expression about absence and fondness whose particulars escape me. Besides, I like him well enough, but I don't want him to think I'm desperate for his company."
"There are worse things you could do than keep your company as an uncommon delicacy," you offer mildly.
"Like assign a Kingsguard to play mother hen to my every moment?"
"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about."
Dinner this night progresses as a more sedate affair, though it doesn't escape your notice that Oberyn is watching you like a hawk. Talk amongst the group is calmer, focusing for most of the time on talk of mummers' dramas that the Velaryons found amongst the late Lord Monford's writings and possessions. It seems he had been collecting scripts from Essos and begun working on one of his own, a retelling of Orys Baratheon's story. Aurane Waters has little interest or passion for the stuff, but he has been quietly passing it around some circles after learning the young Velaryons want to see it completed and staged.
Neither you nor Dany has seen it, probably out of an abundance of caution on the part of its proponents, but Oberyn and Ser Barristan have at least heard about it, and the Grand Maester speaks well of it; he hopes the Lord Protector is able to find someone willing to complete the work. Willas engages politely, but seems distant; you'd consider it rude if you didn't think it likely he is still mulling over last night's conversation.
You might have known better than to hope the calm would keep, though; you are a Targaryen, and the curse "may you live in interesting times" has followed your family with eagerness for centuries.
It starts when the discussion shifts somewhat to the history of Orys Baratheon; no one at your table seems to doubt that he was Aegon's baseborn brother, though it is at least tacitly spoken around. His conduct as Hand of the King, and as a warrior in the Conquest before that, is well-known if somewhat controversial. Then his relationship with his unspoken half-siblings arises as a topic.
"Orys was very fond of Rhaenys," the Grand Maester says casually, "much more so than Visenya. Oh, they understood each other well enough, respected each other as warriors, but they never campaigned together. He took the Stormlands at Rhaenys' side, after all."
"You think that had more to do with preference than simple tactics, Grand Maester?" Willas asks, leaning in with curiosity.
"I would hesitate to say 'preference', my friend," Jace responds, "I don't see anything that suggests he desired her as Aegon did. But as a companion, a friend, I think Orys liked Rhaenys as much as Aegon liked Orys. Had things with Dorne gone differently, I imagine the two of them would have helped Aenys be better prepared to become king."
You spare a quick glance to Oberyn, who doesn't seem troubled by the mention of the old wounds betwixt the Crown and the southernmost kingdom, before you ask your own question. "You don't think a better relationship with Visenya could have made a difference?"
Jace shakes his head. "If anything, I think Visenya and Maegor rather put the young prince off the idea of fear and force as methods of control altogether. Not that his parents were free of brutal impulse, by any means, but I'm sometimes left with the impression that Visenya's line revelled in it, instead of viewing it as a weapon pointed at both ends, to be used sparingly if at all."
"One almost pities Visenya," Dany says. "So much family around her, but none caring for her, save Maegor."
Oberyn muses, "I don't know that Maegor cared for anyone but himself," taking a drink of wine before speaking again. "I would easier believe he mourned the loss of his most strident and dangerous supporter than the loss of his mother."
"What do you think of Visenya, Your Grace?" Willas asks her, looking more attentive to Dany's response than usual.
She shrugs. "I don't think much on her, to be honest with you, my lord. Not much beyond a lesson in the long-term perils of being alienated from your family."
"No interest in emulating qualities of hers, Your Grace?" Jace asks with a casual tone but watchful gaze that, for an uncomfortable moment, reminds you of Varys' days at your father's side.
"Aside from being protective of her child, I struggle to imagine what qualities she had worthy of emulation." Dany answers slowly, evidently (to you, anyway) thinking it through as she speaks.
To your surprise, it's Willas who speaks up in the late queen's defence. "She did have a great deal of influence on the laws of the realm and its governing in the years before the Small Council. She crafted the Kingsguard, began building the Red Keep … she certainly had the king's confidence, if not his affections, for how much he left matters in her care. An argument could be made that she had more lasting impact on Westeros than Rhaenys did."
Oberyn counters, "It's an argument that falls somewhat flat considering whose descendants are in the room. Rhaenys had her own influences on laws and governance, after all, and she arranged more marriages throughout the Seven Kingdoms than her sister ever did … especially if you discount the marriages Visenya arranged for her son," he adds with a smirk.
It's apparently a night for wonders, because Allard Seaworth says something and you don't find yourself wanting to injure him afterwards: "My father didn't know a great deal about the Conquerors, but he did know that Queen Rhaenys cared about the smallfolk and worked to endear the Iron Throne to them. And," he adds, "that Visenya and Maegor undid all of it in just six years and left wounds that even the Conciliator could not fully heal. It's a lesson, he said, that the evil men do lives after them; the good often dies with them."
"That's quite good," the Grand Maester says thoughtfully. "Your father must have a gift with words."
"Grand Maester, no one would be more surprised to hear that said of my father than he," Allard smiles.
"Rhaenys was also given to the arts in ways Visenya never was," Jace comments as his attention returns to Dany, "much like you, Your Grace. Considering that, do you think you would more easily fit Rhaenys' mold than Visenya's?"
"Need I fit into either?" Dany asks. It's subtle, missed by most at the table, but you catch a hint of heat in the question.
From the looks of it, the Grand Maester does as well, for he replies in a placating tone, "Comparisons will inevitably be drawn, Your Grace, given that three Targaryen dragonriders brought Westeros under their rule once more. It is something to at least consider."
"One would hope that some distinction could be made," Dany responds, though with less heat than previously.
"Well, for one thing," you intercede, "Prince Aegon hasn't the figure for a dress, so the comparisons shouldn't go too far."
The round of chuckles diffuses the tension, thankfully, and conversation moves on, but you can see on Dany's face that she'll be thinking about this for some time. Perhaps it's only fitting, you think; poor Willas had a lot to ponder after last night, now it's come her turn.
You try not to think too hard about who might be next.
As the evening winds down, you find yourself desiring of companionship once more. Currently, you believe, Ser Asher is abed after his time on duty, and Dany ended dinner chewing on her thoughts more than any food left to her, so while you'd be well within your rights as their king, as their travel companion you don't wish to impose on either of them tonight.
You open the door to your quarters, and Ser Barristan is on shift this evening, awaiting your command.
You'd like to meet with one of your companions tonight. Who is it?
[ ] Jacaerys. The Grand Maester has been meaning to teach you about the higher mysteries. There is much to learn, and he has intimated that the privacy of a ship is well-suited for the beginnings of such an endeavour. [ ] Oberyn. The Red Viper has seemed a little more ornery of late. Maybe an evening to unwind is what he (and you) could use … and you could get to the cause, if Oberyn knows of it. He also might have gained further thoughts and insights, though it is still rather soon… [ ] Willas. The Heir of Highgarden is a man of whom you know little. He seems interested in Dany, though, and he has made a good showing for himself thus far, so maybe you should start to know him better? [ ] Barristan. The Lord Commander will likely take some persuading to absent himself from duty, but the old knight is a font of knowledge and of insight, if he can be coaxed into offering it. [ ] Allard. He acquitted himself well at dinner tonight, but you think it would be a bad idea to be too much in his presence before going to bed.
Scheduled vote count started by Marlowe310811 on Nov 20, 2021 at 4:59 PM, finished with 15 posts and 9 votes.
[x] Jacaerys. The Grand Maester has been meaning to teach you about the higher mysteries. There is much to learn, and he has intimated that the privacy of a ship is well-suited for the beginnings of such an endeavour.
[X] Barristan. The Lord Commander will likely take some persuading to absent himself from duty, but the old knight is a font of knowledge and of insight, if he can be coaxed into offering it.
of course this one flows like bloody wine. where's this easiness when it comes to working at the other updates?
Many thanks to @Vocalist, from whom the magic terminology and mechanics are borrowed.
[ ] Jacaerys. The Grand Maester has been meaning to teach you about the higher mysteries. There is much to learn, and he has intimated that the privacy of a ship is well-suited for the beginnings of such an endeavour.
Without issue, Ser Barristan quickly retrieves Grand Maester Jacaerys, and you step aside to allow the old man to pass you. You thank the Lord Commander, and ask him to remain but at a slight distance, for your privacy. Before you close the door, you see him take a couple steps so that he isn't standing right before the door, but he could enter in moments if called, and still close enough that nobody could pass him without a struggle.
You turn, and are greeted with the bemusing sight of the Grand Maester, one of the most respected and influential men in the Seven Kingdoms, sitting cross-legged on the floor. He gestures in front of him and says, "If it please you, Your Grace, I find this to be far more effective than sitting at a table or attempting to stand for the duration."
You sit, as comfortably as you can manage, on the floor with the Grand Maester. The ship does not rock exceedingly, but you can feel the rhythmic shift in it back and forth, and the only cushion either of you uses is that which is bestowed upon you naturally. You think to yourself, When was the last time a Grand Maester or a King did this? A small part of you is greatly amused by the idea that you could ever have done this with Pycelle, or that he would have given up the pretense of 'frail old man' for this.
"First, I believe we should dispense with some mistakes and foolishness," Jace says to you. "To call what we study and practice "the higher mysteries" is a dismissive act by the more literal-minded of the Citadel, a convenient heading under which they can simply stuff anything they cannot rationalise or easily explain. Magic is the more honest name for what we do."
"Honest or no, it's a term avoided for good reason," you argue. Sorcery and witchcraft hold heavy cultural baggage in Westeros, and anything not explicitly sanctioned and performed by the Faith tends to make the Faithful uncomfortable. Gods above, even you aren't entirely immune; the idea of bleeding people to death to feed a weirwood's roots and hanging their entrails from its branches makes you squirm.
"In dealing with common men and fools," Jace retorts. "Are you a common man or a fool, Your Grace?"
"I should hope not."
"Then magic is the term I shall use in your company," he says with a warm smile. "Second, I should say that I observe you have some magical ability about you already."
This doesn't come as any great surprise to you; magical abilities of some form have shown up in your bloodline from time to time, and you know that your perception of shatterpoints is not naturally occurring. You tell Jace as much, and he gains an inquisitive air.
"Tell me more about this perception you have," he asks.
"It's difficult to put into words, to quantify," you start. "I believe I first consciously used it in Lys, though I suspect I unconsciously used it in several instances prior to that." You tell him of playing with your Myrish glass and finding the point at which you could strike it and in so doing sunder it. "After that, I began to notice that I could see similar fracture lines and stress points in other items, and in people."
"How does this manifest?"
"I suppose a struck glass continues to be the best metaphor," you explain. "The way that cracks and fissures spread out in a spiderweb from that point. It isn't quite the same, especially with people – these lines aren't fixed upon the surface, but seem to shift and redefine themselves, possess a radiance about themselves, and even reach out towards another person, and sometimes the shatterpoint shifts, changes."
"I see," the Grand Maester rubs at his chin thoughtfully. "Is this within your conscious control?"
You shrug. "Somewhat. It isn't a constant lens over my eyes, if that's what you're asking. But sometimes it seems to just instinctively come to me. Like," you hesitate for a moment, but only a moment. "Like an instance where Prince Aegon asked Oberyn about Elia." The older man's face softens a little, a sad sympathy … perhaps even empathy? I wonder at that … and you continue, "I just looked to my goodbrother, and I could see his cracks and fissures without really meaning to."
"If Your Grace will permit it," he says gently, "I would presume to imagine you were possessed of some concern for Prince Oberyn, and for your nephew, in that moment." You nod. "So it would seem to me that this ability manifests when you sense a need for it, if it will help protect you or those you care for. Otherwise," he tilts his head a bit, like a curious dog, "it is only there if you consciously summon it?"
"It is," you agree. "I don't actively use it to pry into peoples' problems or secrets, if that's your concern," and you do notice the slightest hint of relaxing in his posture. "Though I will use it if I find it necessary."
"The Lord Arryn being one such example?" He supplies, no judgment detectable in his voice.
"Actually, no," You shake your head. "Lord Arryn is just easy to read, and I had the benefit of his former ward giving me insights beyond that. You have a point, though; I might have used it then, if I didn't already know what I needed to, and if he had any kind of cyvasse face."
"Grant me the kindness, Your Grace," he says warmly, "of never asking me to play you in cyvasse. I fear you would find me similarly easy, and you…" he pauses, "I have had less difficulty reading Yi-Tish poems from the age of the Sea-Green Emperors."
"I make no promises, Grand Maester," you smile back, "but I have plenty of people waiting to challenge me in that regard; you needn't fear being asked to jump the line."
He nods, then shifts his legs to sit more comfortably. "I'll ask you to try something for me, Your Grace." You nod, curious where this is going. "If you would close your eyes, and when you're comfortable with it, try to match your breath to the swell of the sea."
Your eyes close, and you give it a try. It's a little disconcerting at first, feeling your world shift to and fro without your eyes reminding you why it feels that way, but it fades as you find the rhythm in your breathing.
"I'll ask that you keep your eyes closed as you breathe, Your Grace," the Grand Maester continues, beyond your sight. "This is a form of meditation, intentional rest and connection with your environment. In this, I will always give you a reason for what I ask you to do. Continue to breathe, and to focus on keeping your breaths even." You do, and he adds, "This helps to clear your mind, to lift away the layers of cares and troubles that come with living in this world. Your mind finds its focus on your immediate world, and your breath within it."
Part of you wonders if that's entirely responsible, being a king in this world after all, but you're willing to at least try it once. Before long, you realise that a tension in your shoulders and back you hadn't even noticed before is leaving you. That's nice, you think idly. Even if nothing else come from this, that's useful.
Jace speaks again, a disembodied voice in the dark of your closed eyes. "Now, Your Grace, please continue to keep your eyes closed, and attempt to see using this unique perspective of yours. Take all the time you need, and please, let me know when you see anything."
Your practical mind rebels at first. How are you supposed to see anything with your eyes closed? But he has those links of smoky steel for a reason, and the Citadel would hopefully know better than to send you someone as useless as the last Grand Maester. So you try.
It comes slowly, at first, and it doesn't feel like sight, exactly; more like the free association that might come with looking at something and knowing other things about it that you aren't physically seeing in that moment. You don't see a fire inside of you, yet you perceive heat, energy, the sedate but implacable power of molten earth ready to flow freely. You perceive a dragon, fire in its throat and ready to strike, proud and wrathful, but aloof, watching, eyes like burning rock and shrouded in smoke.
You speak of these things quietly, as though to not rouse the dragon you perceived, and beyond that perception you heard Jace speak again. "Can you see beyond that?" You don't know. Worth a try.
Eyes remaining closed, your perception shifts away from yourself, and you can sense something alike to that sitting across from you – a hearth ablaze, controlled but ever-consuming, warm and bright but able to eat beyond its bounds if not kept in check. In the coals and embers, you can perceive glowing orange and red, a power simmering but ever-hot that moves and paces inside its bounds, and you somehow know the same dragon is there, too.
These things you speak of, too, and after you finish the Grand Maester speaks again. "When you are ready, Your Grace, breathe deeply, and open your eyes once more."
You do, and the world returns to your vision. It is still evening in your well-appointed cabin on the Royal Vagabond, and you are sitting on the floor with Grand Maester Jacaerys. But your awareness of the things within you, your perception beyond sight, still remains – an echo of its more intensive self, but your eyes flit about the room and you can see where that perception does and does not come into play.
[New Trait! Advanced Magic Sense: You can sense magic that is near you, and get a very good idea of its nature. It turns out that the world is a more magical place than you ever imagined. +2 Learning, +1 Intrigue]
"You are a fast study, my king," Jace says with an openly impressed tone. "It takes acolytes months, sometimes years, to even be able to perceive the magic close by to them, never mind the detail and distance you can manage. And," he adds, "you show an intuitive grasp of pacts."
Your knees are beginning to ache a bit, but you ignore them. "Pacts?"
Jacaerys nods. "I've heard different expressions from different cultures and schools of thought. Pacts are a contract, a bargain, a gift, or a touch of a mightily powerful magical entity, that bestows some small measure of their power upon us mere mortals. For instance," a finger points back and forth between you and he, "what you sensed in me and yourself was some small manifestation of Caeda, the dragon goddess of Valyria."
You blink. "The what."
"I'll thank you not to share this conversation with the High Septon or those of his ilk," Jacaerys remarks dryly. "It's been some time since anyone has been burned alive for heresy, and it's a pattern I don't mean to disrupt." He waits for your nod, then continues. "Yes. Near as I am able to determine, the gods of Valyria were and are real. Caeda, the Mother of Dragons," and you do not resist your instinct to start at the moniker, though Jace takes no notice, "bestowed a measure of her power into the Valyrians, which led to the creation of the dragonlords. That power, that pact, lives on in the blood of their descendants. It can come in an unbroken chain, and it can lay dormant in the blood for generations before it reemerges."
You blink again. "They're real."
"In some sense, yes." He shrugs. "Whether true gods, demigods, or beings of such power as to render the distinction meaningless, I neither know nor trouble to know. Their power is real. Their magic is real. So, too, are many others." He holds up, then ticks down a few fingers. "The Children of the Forest bestowed power upon their allies, and that contract endures to this day. Mother Rhoyne lent power over the rivers to her children; she still remains, likely in some diminished state. The Red God…" he trails off for a moment. "I don't know what that truly is or what is there, but something grants those individuals power."
"They're real."
He chuckles lightly. "I sense I may have given you a little too much to eat all in one meal, Your Grace."
"No, no," you shake your head. "To use a different metaphor, it's deep waters I've come into, but I'm not being pulled under or washed away. It's just," you gesture aimlessly, "a lot."
"It is," he nods. "We can take our time with this, Your Grace. We have another night before reaching Dragonstone, and time aplenty there and back again."
You agree to it, in the end, and stop the lesson there for the night.
Congratulations! With a critical success (and the in-universe justification that you have some existing talents in this arena) you leapfrog over the basic Magic Sense trait and move onto Advanced Magic Sense almost immediately.
In Vocalist's quest "The Silver King", she goes into greater detail about some of the religions and entities that provide pacts in her quest, and her Info segment on the Fourteen Flames of Valyria in particular can provide some additional context and information, for any who are interested. Also, check out her stuff in general, because it's fantastic.
This has been the hardest thing to write for me in the past year. And friends, that is saying something.
tl;dr -- I don't want to be George RR Martin, so I won't be.
I have gained a great deal of sympathy for Martin the past year, finding it so hard to actually make any headway yet not wanting to abandon this thing that you care for and want to finish. Unlike George, however, I'm not contractually obligated ... and I don't know when or if I would be able to complete this at all. And I don't want to just leave this thread to wither and fall into the dregs of the archive left on "in-progress." It is with that in mind that I'm hereby declaring this quest abandoned.
This quest was a learning experience for me, and while I could write I had fun with it. I always had fun interacting with voters, seeing what people were thinking and what people would write themselves. And I still love this little world I've picked up and tweaked to my own design. Going through my notes, posting them here and adding comments and details, I'm reminded how much I liked weaving the tapestry of this complicated, maddening world. It guts me to leave it behind. But I have to.
One thing I don't want to do is just walk away from the table and leave everything unanswered. So, with that in mind, I'll tuck into spoiler boxes the things that I do have written, and the things I (broadly speaking) had planned. I'll also be around, so I can answer any questions anyone has, to the best of my ability; sometimes you may have to settle for an unsatisfying answer. There's a noir murder-mystery film, whose name escapes me, where the writer was asked by a studio head, "but who killed the driver?" and he responded, "Damned if I know." I think about that a lot, when people expect writers to be omniscient, even if its about worlds they've created.
I thank you all for participating, for reading, and reacting, and encouraging (even when, hell especially when, I didn't deserve it). I hope I can answer some questions, and I hope I can write like this again someday. So. Here goes.
For the "Blood of the Dragon" chapters, you would arrive at Dragonstone to find the island sparsely populated, and the castle all but deserted. Returning your mother Rhaella's crown to her tomb would weaken the barriers enough that she would be able to see you, one last time. I'd do my best to rip at your heartstrings a bit, and depending on how things went, either she could help you find some books on dragonlore, she could offer you some insights on magic, or you could just take your remaining time with her, to be eight years old for a minute and have your mother sit with you.
The problem with Dragonstone is, without the blood of dragons on the island, there are thin places deep in the castle's catacombs where something(s) can slip through if there isn't dragonblood above to deter it from coming across. And there hasn't been dragonblood of any kind on Dragonstone for almost a year.
You would in-character be finding yourself haunted during your days in the castle and especially at night by things you cannot see but you swear something's there, with bad enough event rolls (or taking up options to explore the catacombs "for the chance at long-hidden treasures, be it knowledge or other possibilities") leading you to be confronted by the something(s) sooner rather than later. Inevitably though, they would take notice of your arrival, and being emboldened, they would try to drive you away or kill you. Out-of-character, those more versed in their Lovecraftian mythos would be able to recognise these creatures as lloigor. Simply put, while you have gained an understanding of magic and have skill with a blade, you are not a sorcerer and you are not a great warrior; you would find yourself in serious danger, and while it is unlikely (barring a natural 1 or a few of them) that you'd be killed outright by the lloigor, you likewise would be unlikely to beat them decisively either, and your life would be imperiled by an injury. Barring the chance that you embodied your inner Arthur Dayne and bested these nightmares on your own, though, you would be aided by Grand Maester Jace, and ultimately have your bacon saved by none other than Melisandre.
Using her empowered magics to functionally banish the lloigor from this plane, after that point Melisandre would hang around for a few days to help heal you and otherwise generally be her usual self: melodramatic, unnecessarily mysterious and cryptic ... until and unless you confronted her on it.
Mel would then start dropping several bombs on you: informing you that she has foreseen the Long Night coming, making casual mention that she senses a Pact of Fire and king's blood in the Grand Maester, and suggesting that it is possible you are the Prince that was Promised, but she is confused by you not burning as bright as her visions suggested. What she would not tell you, or anyone else save Kinvara (House Baratheon's resident Red Priestess) is that you are one of several candidates she has seen ... and she cannot for the life of her tell who it is for certain.
There was a plot thread, though once votes trended away from it I could not figure out how to artfully re-weave it in, that you could have discovered at the doors in your dream; choosing the door radiant with light would have led you into a vision ... or so you initially would think ... of a place you have never been and do not recognise.
[ ] A doorway radiant with light
You open into another room of stone.
If you weren't so familiar with the stone of the Red Keep, you would have thought you had just opened a door into the next room. It's a different colour, set and laid differently than the way of Maegor's builders. And, you allow yourself a little pride in believing, even the lowest storeroom and dungeon in the Red Keep has some character to it, some uniqueness. This room, you note as you step in further, is remarkable only in how utterly unremarkable it is. There is a nondescript table, chair and cot. No paper or place settings on the table, a plain blanket on the cot, no pillow there or on the chair. Walking around the side of it, you can feel the chair is rough-hewn and only somewhat sturdy, not made by any man worthy of the craft.
For all the lustre of the doorway behind you, you can't help but feel a bit underwhelmed.
Then the door opens again.
You glance up to see a young woman in currant-hued robes walk in. Mechanically, as though she has done this a thousand times before and will a thousand times again, she takes the tray she is carrying and sets it down on the table without looking at it or at you as she walks to the cot. She lets out a long sigh, stretches, and shrugs off her heavy cloak before unwrapping her headscarf, tucking it into the sleeve, and bundling both into a wad that, it appears by where she drops it, will serve as her pillow.
She turns your way then, and this is the first time you get a good look at her. Taller than the average woman, she is still shorter than you, though not by much and certainly taller than many knights you've served with. Her skin is pale, unblemished by time or tempest, and even at two-and-twenty you envy her a little for that. Her neck is unadorned, her face heart-shaped, and the hair now freed from her headscarf is the color of deep burnished copper, long and clearly cared-for. Her eyes are the red of embers in the heart of a fire.
She starts a little when she sees you, but she does not scream. Her eyes widen only a bit before she blinks them rapidly, a look of confusion on her face.
"What are you doing in my room?" She asks with a low, melodic voice that feels warm, but almost oppressively so; like a humid day where the air itself compels you to submit.
You take a moment to find your voice. "I … don't know, my lady."
She fixes you with a piercing, wry grin. "I have been called many things, but 'lady' is new. I think I like it." The wryness fades, but her piercing gaze remains. "How is it you came here and do not know your purpose in doing so?"
You shrug, still feeling a bit flippant. It is your dream, after all. "You're the vision, my lady; your guess is sure to be better than mine."
Her eyes narrow as she mouths a word, before they widen. "You are seeing me?"
"…yes?" You answer, more than a little confused. "I see you, you see me."
She shakes her head energetically. "No, that is not my meaning. You, you are Seeing me?"
This time you hear the capitalising of the word, but it doesn't clarify anything. "…yes?" Her face becomes a bit flustered, and you feel a bit amused, despite yourself; it's been some time since someone was so irritated by you without you even trying hard for it.
"This word you used, this 'vision', I do not know this. Is this meaning sight, or the Seeing beyond sight?"
Your humour fades. "The second one," you answer. "You're a vision and don't know what the word is?"
"I have never heard the Westerosi word before," she tells you with a bit of a huff, "and it threw me off-balance."
"Why?" you ask. She gives you a look then, that suggests she is either very confused, very concerned, or very certain you are an idiot. You're big enough to admit that, really, any of them are options at this moment.
"Because," she says slowly, as if to calm a dangerous person or to inform a stupid one, "we have been speaking Valyrian, and you dropped this foreign word into the conversation."
"Skoros?"
… huh. So you have been. You hadn't noticed it until she pointed it out, but yes; she spoke first, in Valyrian, and you answered her in kind without thinking about it. If you were awake, surely you would have noticed she and you were speaking in Valyrian and not in Common before now. Why can't dreams just follow some kind of reason?
"Strange that you would think you were speaking the speech of Westeros with me," she comments. "Few who speak Valyrian would deign to learn so low a tongue. That leads me to a different question: who are you?"
"Nyke Viserys hen Targārio Lentrot, Dāri Vestero, Zaldrīzo Ānogar." Of course, now that you're aware of speaking Valyrian you actually have to think about doing it. Luckily, announcing your name proudly was one of the earliest skills embedded in you by your bloodline, in this or any other language.
"A bold statement, dragonlord," her gaze amused. "I imagine that works to impress those who do not know there is no Targaryen King in Westeros. It will not work so easily on me."
That almost offends you, but it has been a long time since your temper moved faster than your mind. This dream started in the past, you think. Perhaps this is also in the past, and the Restoration has not succeeded yet. Why would you need to see this, though?
...
...
Idly, you remark that you haven't spoken this much Valyrian since you lived in Lys.
...
...
"Mel, come along," her companion at the door says.
She's already out the door following the other one before your brain catches up to you. 'Mel', she said … "Melisandre?" You call out as you step into the hall, looking to follow.
No one is there.
Instead of a glimpse into the near future, as you were offered with the other two doors, you would enter into Melisandre's past. Melisandre's distant past. And you would unintentionally set in motion her interest in and eventual pursuit of you (a subplot from the previous quest).
In taking that door, you would have had this conversation with Melisandre when she was alone with you at the end of the arc's events.
The Red Woman meets your gaze evenly as she speaks. "Three have come and gone before you returned to my sight. The first died only months after I learned of his existence, too young and too far from being king to have been who I perceived. A lifetime passed before the second became known to me; I only had to see him once, from afar, to know he was too soft, too heavy and too kindly to be you." Her mouth set in a grim line. "I long believed that the third could be you: I met him in Lys, knew him in passing; he looked like you and he sounded like you; he had a king's presence and a king's mind, like you. And when the time came, he ruled like a king, the clever mind behind his dour brother and his idiot kin. But he was not you. He would never have called himself a king, even in his own mind, while his kings lived, and when they did not he was too old to be you."
You can say nothing.
"I learned of your birth as much of the world did, your father obsessively proud to have a second son live and thrive, and I kept half a mind on your age and when you might be old enough to be who I saw. Then what happened before, happened again; your dour brother died, and idiots took over his kingdom. You disappeared with a rumoured infant sister, and then there was nothing for almost a decade. I did not see you in the Lord's Light, and I heard nothing, and so I believed you had died like the others that failed to match the man I met. Then a man of your age, with a sister of the right age, made a name for himself in Lys. I could not leave where I was, so rather than observe from afar, I put forth the bounty to see this Valarr Vaeltigar brought to me. I was unsuccessful, and when you returned to Westeros I went to Volantis. I would wait, and watch, and if you were able to retake your kingdom, then I would come to you and see my vision made flesh. And now, here before you, I stand."
Her eyes are like the rest of her, having lost none of their vitality, but somehow convey far more dangerousness and drive than you saw before. And they are fixated on you.
"I have crossed oceans of time to find you, Viserys hen Targārio Lentrot, Dāri Vestero, Zaldrīzo Ānogar," she recited.
In canon there's some mystery as to just how old Melisandre actually is despite her appearance; in this quest I was going to say "Mel was joining R'hllor and receiving premonitions of Viserys before Daenys the Dreamer led her family to Dragonstone". Melisandre is more than 450 years old, and she has waited for a long time to find you.
Other, minor character beats:
Jace is not afraid of Melisandre, he is fucking petrified. You would eventually discover why.
Depending on rolls, Willas Tyrell might have proven you don't need to be able-bodied to be valiant, he might have won Dany's heart (or they might have only gotten so far as friends) and he might have been killed by lloigor. Which, hoo boy, that would have complicated things with House Tyrell.
Likewise depending on rolls, Asher may have missed the action altogether, may have slain a 'dragon' (or at least, their eldritch horror equivalent) or been killed by them.
Dany would be hardened by degrees (depending on how many of her companions were injured and how severely, or if they were killed) and after Viserys' injuries and attendant day or two being incapacitated, would dangle a plot thread for you that she thinks a formalised succession should be codified into law, and while she wouldn't say so, you'd be left with the impression that she deserves a place in that succession in her own right rather than just as a potential future mother to a king.
The only way lloigor best or kill Barristan Selmy is with 2+ critical successes on their parts and 2+ critical fails on his part, in terms of combat mechanics. It takes more than a spooky invisible monster to kill Barristan Selmy (once again, HBO usurpers, go fuck yourselves).
Meanwhile, over in King's Landing,
There were several chapters yet to go for "Prince of the City" (I had hoped to start posting them alternating with "Blood of the Dragon" chapters) the vast majority of which was only partially blocked out plot-wise:
III: I - Meeting with Ned, Egg reports the progress the Watch is making in general, and his lack of progress in finding his killer in particular. He tells Ned in confidence of meeting with Tywin, and Ned suggests a sellsword as a plausible candidate. Privately, Ned wonders if Jon will choose the world of ice or fire, and while he will respect whatever choice his 'son' makes, he admits to himself he hopes Jon will come home with him when his time as Master of Laws is done.
III: II - Ser Kirth Vance is a Riverlander and companion of Lord Edmure, who enlisted to help with reforming the City Watch. He finds it to be hateful work, and that to his mind desertions are almost as common as development. He aids Aegon and Ser Perren Donniger in street investigation, around where the girl was found. The three manage to find a Qohorik girl who joint-operates a lesser brothel. She tells them of a fat Dothraki who collects tithes and samples her girls' wares, and that he always smells of fish.
III: III - Sparring with Sarella and Nymeria (thus far his favourite cousin, though Nym graciously does not let on that she can tell) Egg discusses what he knows so far. These two, being set up as the especially clever two of the Sand Snakes, begin to put together several clues: first being, the type of person Tywin describes is most likely a sellsword; the people being threatened are whores and whoremongers; and thinking on the "irrational pattern" of events, Nym hits on the idea of religious celebrations, and soon after recalls the high holy days for the Black Goat. Nymeria is curious about the insights he has, but does not put together, nor is told, that he spoke with Tywin. Egg requests of his cousins that they quietly find out who the newest men are on Butchers' Row, as he fears a golden cloak would spook his quarry.
IV: I - Obara Sand and Asha Greyjoy accompany Sarella after she seeks their help, visiting the dockside sprawl, and they go to question some of the whores in the area. Perhaps unsurprisingly, they come across Theon Greyjoy purveying an establishment, and while the Sands talk to the workers, Asha and Theon reminisce about what little they remember of home, and what may come next for one or both of them. At this point the Sands return, Sarella having found Nymeria also partaking at this establishment. The returning Sands catch Theon's eye, specifically Nymeria, but Asha warns him off ('Obara likes spears. Nym prefers spearwives') and they walk back into the city. Obara tells of a Dothraki pimp who is newer to town, that the working girls are wary of. Nym links this to the Dothraki she tailed, seen lurking around a butchers' shop (that the last owner is claimed to have left town as the Targaryens approached) and they coincidentally manage to see him going to a ramshackle warehouse by the docks. Asha offers her input that the fat foreigner lacks the physical dexterity needed to do what Egg's killer does.
"]
ASHA
Hundreds of quays reached into the waters beyond the walls of King's Landing, hosting all manner from Ironborn longships to Mander merchant vessels to fishermens' boats barely deserving of the name. Between the quays and the walls there were a mass of ramshackle buildings, some built from driftwood, some from scuttled ships, some from scraps of timber brought over from the Kingswood. There were bait shacks, pot shops, merchant's stalls, alehouses, and whores aplenty. The whole place reeked of fish and saltwater, one of the only places in King's Landing that the smell of shit could be overpowered.
It felt more like home to Asha Greyjoy than any other part of the city. Pyke had never in her memory been a thriving island, but Asha still remembered the packed dwellings not far from the water, remembered the markets, remembered the smell and the swearing and the mix of peoples brought in by the sea. The lack of Drowned Men and salt wives gives it away, she thought, but it helped on days when she missed home. Sunspear had never filled that gap in the same way for her, with its dusty streets and scorching heat.
Obara Sand walked alongside her as they moved through the slums of the Rush, spear casually carried across her shoulders to ensure men were forced to give them both a wide berth. Asha absently drummed her fingers on the blade of the small axe tucked in her belt, tapping it just right so that it caught some reflection of the noonday sun, and it made her smile a little to see some men pale and look away altogether. On her other side, she couldn't quite see Sarella Sand's eyeroll so much as she could feel it.
Sarella hissed at them, "I know you two enjoy not attracting men--"
"You can talk," Asha interrupted, ruffling her fingers through Sarella's boyish-cut hair. Sarella swatted at her hand as she made a protesting sound and tried to twist away, but Asha had practice with bullying a younger sibling, and half a foot on her.
"Don't encourage her," Obara said with a sigh. "She'll never stop."
"Are you talking to her or to me?" Sarella asked.
"Yes."
Sarella groaned. "Egg asked me to help him," she said, agitation clear and present on her face.
"And you asked us to help you," Asha answered.
Beside her, Obara whispered, "A horrible decision, really."
Ignoring the comment, Asha continued. "Do you think we don't know what we're doing?"
"No." The exasperation on her face would be worrying, Asha thought, if it wasn't so funny. "But I don't know what we're doing."
"We are going to get information, the kinds that a goldcloak cannot get," Obara offered with what was, for her, surprising patience. "We will see what we can learn of this, and maybe you can learn from us while we do it."
Then she turned back around with a much more characteristic snarl and poked the butt-end of her spear in the direction of the slack-jawed goatherd moving too slow for her liking in front of their little party. "Fuck offalready, you unwashed zorsefucker." He looked her way and started to say something, but the words died in his mouth as he managed to see that Sarella and Asha were likewise armed and (in Asha's case) unforgiving in appearance. After giving them an impotent scowl, he shooed his goats farther away, and disappeared into the crowd.
Sarella gestured in the direction of the fleeing goatherd. "This is what I don't understand, Obara: how are we supposed to learn anything from these men if you drive all of them away?"
"We are not going to learn anything from these men," Obara said with the same casual certainty that she would state the day's weather.
Sarella looked at her eldest sister incredulously. "Then what are we doing in this stinking cesspool?"
Asha smiled at their young companion. "We're in a port, Sarella." She ignored her grumbling what sounded suspiciously like 'same difference' and continued, "There's people in ports who hear about everything, from what's happened on Leng to what's happened on Lonely Light and everywhere in between. They hear what ships have come in and for how long and what's recently left. They hear about who's new in town, they hear strange things and frightening things and wondrous things, and the only other people they talk to about it is each other. They're some of the best sources for gossip, rumours and hard information, all in one place." She stopped in the street and gestured to their destination, which now lay in front of them.
"We're going to talk to whores, Sarella."
IV: II - Ser Jacelyn Bywater, as Captain of the River Gate, is briefed by Egg on what he will need as he means to strike both locations (the Butchers' Row shop, and the warehouse) at once. Bywater has been impressed with the young prince's efforts and personal attention, and hopes the city doesn't eat him alive, as it does most men of decency.
IV: III - Finally taking Aegon's perspective, Part 1 has discussion of the two locations, and a vote to decide which raid Aegon will take part in. A hidden option will be to trust in his father's 'dragon dreams' and go with whatever path that suggests.
At this point, I'll draw back the curtain a bit on all this: the killer is Vargo Hoat, leader of the Brave Companions. After being hired as part of the larger campaign to retake Westeros, the Brave Companions sort of fell off the grid for Viserys ... but they got themselves a new patron, and inserted themselves into the business of handling Littlefinger's brothels, "acquiring" a butcher shop on the side as an increasingly insufficient outlet for Hoat's increasing bloodlust and instability (more on that later).
Upon further inspection, you'd find little clues seeded back quite a ways that the Brave Companions were active in the city, from as unsubtle as Timeon of Dorne being brought in by the goldcloaks on unrelated crimes in Chapter 2, to as subtle as a black goat cropping up in Chapter 1 (and references to Qyburn farther back than that). You'd also find that the setting was not static; by not moving to take over the brothels in an earlier vote, space was left for the Brave Companions to insert themselves and start causing problems in King's Landing.
V: I - Theon is visiting a different brothel (because Theon) with Jon waiting for him outside, refusing to partake even on Theon's coin (because Jon). Theon sees the whoremaster have a clash with Vargo Hoat. When Hoat makes a blatant threat, Theon puts two and two together, stumbles out only partly clothed, and tells Jon that they need to find Egg. Jon says that a raid is being carried out, and they should tail Hoat.
V: II - Part 2 of Aegon's perspective follows the raid. If the docks, Zollo the Fat is the intended target, but Utt is discovered with a boy and killed by a disgusted Ser Perren, and foreign influence is alluded to (Mellario is somewhat involved, paying them for eyes inside the city walls). If the butcher shop, Shagwell and Iggo put up a fight, Shagwell proving a vexation to Ser Perren, and evidence is found of Littlefinger's involvement. Regardless of where is chosen, Hoat appears and brutally murders Ser Perren, gore splattering across Aegon and the quickly-arrived Jon, storyline ensues. Theon and Jon engage the others, while Hoat and Urswyck fight Aegon. Some magic ensues, and Aegon slays Hoat just as he is about to finish a wounded Jon.
V: III - Afterwards, Aegon meets with Tywin and discusses the aftermath.
Tugging the curtain back farther: the Brave Companions were contracted to take over Littlefinger's brothels ... by Littlefinger himself. He is not going down without a fight, and he has more ladder to climb. Maybe you'd find this evidence, maybe you wouldn't. But it was out there to be found, with the right choices and the right rolls. Because Vargo Hoat is greedy and not a loyal beast (to Men, anyway) he also has been sending the information he collects for Littlefinger (though not the coin; he's not loyal but he's not stupid, either) to Lady Mellario, Arianne Martell's mother.
Some of the aforementioned plot beats are in reference to the fact that the Brave Companions are a fucked up group of people; a pervert septon, dishonored Dothraki, etc. None as fucked up as Vargo, however, and here you'd see why: Vargo Hoat has been getting awfully chatty with his god. The Black Goat of Qohor isn't just a creeptastic symbol; it is none other than Shub Nigguroth, the Black Goat with a Thousand Young, Lord of the Woods*. When Vargo talks to it, the Black Goat's been talking back, and anyone who knows their mythos knows, bad things happen to people who regularly converse with the eldritch horrors. Vargo is able to channel a fraction of the Black Goat's power, and this makes him into a godsdamn killing machine when he opens up that channel. It also makes him incurably insaner with each instance, but what's that to the champion of a god?
*fun aside here (well, fun for me, anyway): the High Valyrian that Viserys hears in his vision translates to this name; he mistranslates 'Goat' as 'Beast' because it makes little sense to him in context, and he isn't educated enough about Qohor's creepy religion to associate the Black Goat with "Lord of the Woods", even though Qohor is known for its foreboding forests. Viserys is the protagonist, sure, but he is not infallible. And, not to be too much of a shit about it, but if you wanted to double-check Viserys' translations, I did provide the manual for which to do so.
There would come a moment when, in the midst of combat, Aegon would see Vargo Hoat move to kill Jon Snow, and try his best to get through the 'battlefield' (is it a battlefield when it's less than twenty men overall?) but can see he isn't going to make it in time as he tries to fight through the horde.
One of the side-effects of the natural-100 Aegon rolled for his arc would be revealed here: while he isn't very in-touch with the magic in his family's veins, he is once in a while haunted by dreams similar to what his father had (which he has Feelings about) but he also has a far more valuable one (to his estimation). Aegon's nat100 unlocked a kind of "what will happen in the next five seconds" foresight that would have OOC mechanical effects more or less equating to "I know what weapon is going to go where and every move my opponents are going to make within this brief window". Moving less like a man-at-arms and more like a waterdancing master swordsman, Egg would breeze through his opponents, killing them easily, and drive his blade through Hoat's back, before leveraging the dying man-beast (becoming increasingly mutated by the touch of his wrathful god) away from Jon and off the edge of the docks, before the magic (and adrenaline) leave him.
Some text included below, after the climactic fight:
Breathing heavily, Aegon leaned against the wall opposite Jon. To him, it looked as though Jon had intended to sit on the knee-height crate behind him, but had either slid off of it and onto the ground, or simply missed it entirely.
Above them, the smoke began to turn grey. The fires are dying, Aegon thought. Good. I'd be in worse trouble if the docks went ablaze.
"You think you'll be in trouble?" Jon asked him, looking up from the ground.
"…that was out loud?" Aegon blinked. He must have been more worn out than he first reckoned.
Jon gave a nod that looked less like an affirmative and more like he was trying to not fall over completely. "Don't know why," he sighed out.
"Watchmen are dead. Buildings burned, answers probably lost. Any help he had we didn't know about, likely gone. Hoat's certainly not going to answer any questions." He wiped at his brow. His hand came away red and black. Grime, soot, and some of Hoat and Ser Perren, most like.
Jon glanced over at the dead man, his head lolling on his shoulder. "I don't get the sense he'd give you answers. Not any you wanted. But," he flopped back to face Aegon again, "he won't kill more people. His little empire is dead. Whores will feel a lot safer, too." He let out a little chuckle. "That alone might make you the toast of every man in the city. You did good today, Your Grace."
"Not good enough," Aegon sighed. "Not for me."
"Good enough by a bastard's estimation, if that helps any." Jon gave him a little smile.
Aegon carefully bent over, keeping himself still propped against the wall but leaning closer to Jon. "I think you're getting delirious from blood loss," he said as he took his gloves off.
"I've been scratched worse riding in the Wolfswood," Jon scoffed as he brought the stained cloth away from his arm, and both of them could see his wound had slowed to a drip. Not nearly so bad as Aegon had feared, but it was not a shallow cut and it could worsen easily.
Aegon made a note in his head to summon Warrek's former healer; he thought that the old knight's arm had healed very clean, and he wanted the same care brought now. Taking the cloth from Jon, he wiped at the still-damp bits of Ser Perren on Jon's forehead. "I feel like I've brought you into my world, after all."
"I got here on my own," Jon said, wincing once as the cloth brushed over what would likely become an impressive bruise. As Aegon continued to absently mop away the mess, his brother found his eye. "But I appreciate the company."
...
...
TYWIN
"I understand that a banquet is to be thrown in your honour in a few hours. Yet instead of taking your hour in the sun, you're in the dark with me. Why is that?" Tywin peered through the bars. "Do you feel there's something you missed, something else you should have done?"
Prince Aegon shook his head. "I did what I had to."
"Then it isn't some imagined failure or falling short of an ideal that troubles you, is it?" He sat at his table, eyes never leaving the prince. "You don't feel an absence of justice in your actions."
"Killing Vargo Hoat felt just," Aegon said. "I don't need a trial to tell me he was guilty."
Tywin steepled his fingers, like the peaks of Baelor's Sept. "Is there something you need to be told? I doubt a 'good work' from me would mean much of anything to you. I can remind you of your oaths to serve and defend the city, though it might come across as a taunt." He paused. "Or is it something you need to tell?"
The prince had very few physical tells, and Tywin respected that. But his foot did shuffle a little, betraying some restless thing within that strained to let slip. His solitude, unaccompanied by a gaoler or a fellow goldcloak, said it was something he wanted to keep unheard by anyone outside the block. That Ser Warrek did not attend him, either, made Tywin suspect it was something he did not want to even give voice to.
He didn't have to wait long for the prince to speak. "Jaehaerys, my great-grandfather, is supposed to have said 'When a Targaryen is born, the gods flip a coin. One side greatness, the other madness.' My grandfather," he all but spat, "clearly bore that out."
...
...
Young Aegon looked, to Tywin's eye, as if in that moment he were afraid of what was under his own skin. "I have never felt so alive as I did when I killed Hoat and his men."
"Many men who served under me, men of the West without a drop of dragons' blood in them, felt the same way in the wars and after them. That feeling itself need not be a sign of madness," Tywin said. "Killing must feel good to the gods, too. They do it every day. Yet we do not call them mad. Indeed, are we not told to celebrate them and praise their greatness?"
It seemed like the prince was grasping for some small moment of levity when he replied, "That seems to depend on who you ask."
"Old or New, Drowned or Red," Tywin observed, "they all behave the same. They crushed roofs down on thousands in the Free Cities with the ashfall from the fires of the Dothraki Sea and choked the life from the ones who tried to escape."
"You think that the gods felt good about that?"
"They felt powerful."
So. Couple things.
The vision Viserys had was not of the distant past or of a resurgent House Blackfyre; it was a vision of Jon and Aegon working together to combat a champion/vessel of the Black Goat (red and white dragons). The squids and snakes he saw were Cryptic Vision Asshole speak for the Sands and Greyjoys, who would be trying to get people to safety in the background of the scene. Vocalist had clever little details like that in the visions she gave to Rhaegar over in her quest, so I borrowed the idea.
Seeds would be planted here, in the end, of allowing you to recruit Jon Snow to the City Watch as Aegon's squire (and therein gain him as a Hero Unit), opening up a path for Aegon to explore his own unique connection to the family's magic heritage, and Tywin Lannister possibly being set up to remain in King's Landing as a Hannibal Lecter stand-in, eventually to emerge as a counter-influence on Aegon to Viserys and Oberyn. Maybe someday he'd be able to escape. Maybe someday he'd prove useful enough that Aegon made other decisions regarding him. And maybe Aegon's influence on Tywin in turn would moderate him from some of his more destructive impulses (more on that later).
Ser Perren Donniger (an OC) is a name that's popped up a couple times, and I'll reveal why: House Donniger has a coat of arms that bears a red sun. Taking a leaf from George's book, both Jon and Aegon are splattered with blood from a man whose sigil has a star on it. The two of them find new purpose and new insight into themselves ('rebirth', in a sense) on the docks of King's Landing, amidst salt (from the sea) and smoke (from the burning buildings) beneath a bleeding red star (blood and gore from the remains of Ser Perren).
At the end of the final chapter, you'd see:
Results:
Aegon becomes a full-fledged knight, gains title and trait "Prince of the City", graduates to "Skilled Fighter".
Jon Snow has a new potential path open to him, for good or ill. He is building a relationship with Prince Aegon, and he is known among the men of the Watch.
Tywin Lannister finds young Aegon intriguing. He isn't quite sure what to think. Yet.
And, tucked in transparent text beneath it all,
In the distance, Melisandre curses spectacularly about more people coming to be potential candidates for Azor Ahai. "How many must find their destinies amidst salt, smoke and bleeding stars?!"
Going further out from here, things were less generally planned out, though there were some specifics sitting around (and plot threads you might or might not interact with). So, first, I'll go backwards a bit, and start with the thing that had a LOT of dangling plot threads hanging off it: Melisandre's visions in the flames.
Melisandre's visions way back when had specific things they alluded to, though many if not most she did not know of herself.
Going beat by beat:
She saw a lonely island, fires burning bright, waves eating ceaselessly at its stone. Roars, cries, screams no human voice could make. Shadows, cast by the fires she saw within, whispered in the dark, promising desires and doom to be delivered in equal measure.
This was not, in fact, Dragonstone, or Lonely Light (as I feared the "lonely island" phrasing might lead you in the direction of). This is Lorath. Lorath, you'd soon discover, is in deep shit.
a woman falling, riding, falling again
This was in reference to Mya Stone, the Lovely Goatherd.
In the next turn, you would be given an option to send Beshka and Asha greyjoy to investigate the folk tales and tavern ballads. If you sent them, upon finding one of Robert's many bastards they would be bringing her in before anyone else could lay hands on her and get Ideas. In the process, they would be set upon by clansman raiders, and Mya would fall, ride, fall again (I wouldn't be especially subtle, in the hopes that someone would link it back to Mel's visions) and depending on rolls, everyone would get away and back to King's Landing, or Mya would be captured by the clansmen, who are in service to another. You'd have the option of letting Asha & Beshka pursue that thread if they failed to bring her in. Otherwise, Mya could become a recurring character, or we'd figure things out more from there.
If you didn't send them, there'd be an end-of-round interlude where you'd see her trying to escape clansmen being sent to capture her, and her fate there would depend on the roll of the dice.
eyes watching that looked like the sea, whirling in motion on the surface but cold and fathomless below
These are the eyes of Petyr Baelish. He knows who Mya Stone is, and he has designs to use her as a pawn to get the Stormlands under his control once he gets the legitimate House Baratheon out of the way. He'd rather bring her in carefully, but if his hand is forced, he'll send some Vale clansmen, disposable as they are to him.
a woman pour flames into a cup and watch a man drink and writhe in pain as she took all that was his
This was meant as a headfake towards Dacey Bolton, which unfortunately it looked like no one picked up on. Quick aside on that; it was alluded to in rumours and whispers, but Domeric and Dacey weren't home at the Dreadfort long before they found Roose Bolton's "workshop". Domeric didn't handle it well; he was almost catatonic and violently ill for some time, while Dacey (being Dacey) took charge and burned every single thing she found down there, to the last scrap. People were smelling 'pelts' of human skin burning, which led to an aside elsewhere of people in that part of the north being put off of pork.
The truth, which you could have eventually pieced together with the things you'd hear out of the Vale, was that the woman doing dirty deeds was Lysa Arryn. More on that later.
Caves, deep and dark and little embers floating in the depths before flickering out one by one, towers of black stone crumbling and the hell they held at bay laying in wait as the tallest tower clung to existence
This was a reference to the Five Forts, far in the East of Essos, and therein a reference to Purple Days (a different ASOIAF AU, that is fantastic. a buckwild fuckin' ride, but fantastic).
Where is the dark tower? What stone is this, what devilry tears it asunder? But her hope of insight was dashed as the tower fell away from her sight, the ruins of its castle becoming another ruin, deadly silent yet power screamed from within it
Summerhall was the latest ruin. More on that later.
A child of stone screamed not in pain but in fear as flames closed in
Depending on your choices, this would either be Mya Stone (being pursued by Petyr Baelish) or Shireen Baratheon, who is being influenced by the much more subtle Kinvara towards a path of R'hllorite sorcery.
Fire spread from her to a woman and then a man, burning brighter than any she'd ever seen, so bright it burned the land around it as dragons rose from the flames to watch from above
The woman in question is Kinvara regardless (if Mya Stone was not retrieved by Asha & Beshka, Kinvara would eventually claim her from Baelish for her kings' blood; if she was recovered, Kinvara would use Shireen's blood). The man has no face that Melisandre can make out because it is Azor Ahai. Kind of. More on that later.
You would have at some point received Rumours (and insight from your Master of Whispers) about Essos.
Of Lorath, nothing has been heard for some time. The last ship to visit returned to Braavos not long ago, with tales of islands abandoned, food left upon tables unfinished, hastily scribed words "Achamoth" and "Vach-Viraj" found in multiple places across the islands, and a thin, monotonous piping of an unseen flute. Approaching the labyrinth of Lorassyon proved impossible as every man who attempted found themselves fleeing in terror from something they could not see nor name nor describe.
The gates of Qohor are sealed. Nothing has gone in, and nothing has come out … beyond blood and ashes in the river Qhoyne. A lot of it.
On the walls, the Unsullied are nowhere to be seen; within the walls, sacrifices to the Black Goat go unanswered, as ever-more-highborn bodies float past, ritually murdered like the criminals and lowborn that preceded them; smoke has been seen over the forests of Qohor.
…
Alesander's Army: D100 => 78: Ruthlessly looting Vaes Dothrak has left the pillaging army in possession of considerable riches and a significant number of slaves 'liberated' from the Dothraki hordes. That said, challenges lay ahead for the army; the Great Grass Sea is burned to ashes behind them, and ahead lies uncertain paths and untrustworthy allies. Do they march through the ashes of the savannahs to Slavers' Bay? Follow the Stone Road into the Bone Mountains, and hope that Yi-Ti is in a welcoming mood? Brave the Red Wastes and make for Qarth? Or ford the Womb of the World and risk the forests of the Ifequevron, gambling on the hospitality of the hairy men of Ib? The obvious answer would be to backtrack and return to the Free Cities, but laden with slaves and gold the army senses the target that would be marked upon their backs.
I suspected that burning the Dothraki Sea would come back to bite Alesander, the idiot. I imagine it felt satisfying at the time, but with an army and its mounts to feed, not to mention half of Essos wanting a word with him for the ash that's fallen on their heads, poisoned their waters, killed their crops and livestock … he might be better off taking his chances with the forests and the Ibbenese. – Oberyn Martell
Dothraki Remnant: D100 => 66: Refugees do not fare well in this world. It is known. But the horselords have faced graver threats and survived, and here and there some members of their people persist. Few and far between, the largest group of survivors is led by a young khal Zaajho, crossing the Bone Mountains into the lands from whence their people came. Whispers speak of a fortunate (or, depending on who you ask, unfortunate) few who fled into the Ifequevron and survive in the long-forsaken woods.
Now then.
Lorath, as previously mentioned, is in deep shit. Elder gods and eldritch abominations are breaking through and pulling things back with them. Specifically, the Blind God Azathoth, who makes a startlingly good stand-in for who-or-whomever Boash is intended to be in Martin's mythos. Its descendant, Shub-Niggurath, has been harmed by inhabitants of this world, and the Blind God intends to inflict some Consequences.
Qohor was going to find out the hard way what happens when their god is failed. Granted, only part of the Black Goat's refusal to answer any prayers or grant any boons is on them (the channel with Vargo went both ways, and it needs some time to recover from its defeat at Aegon's hands) but they would inherit the whirlwind.
Alesander was something of a question mark for me; he had too much impact on how the world had changed to not bear mentioning, but he wasn't my focus either. All I knew, when I rolled for him and his army was, they've been attempting genocide against the Dothraki, and absent some 90+ rolls I am not going to just let them off easily for that. And their scorched earth campaign has had devastating impacts on Western Essos that will be felt for years to come. Many people would not be happy with that. And gratitude (for ending the Dothraki threat) has a short half-life, especially in the face of starvation and ruination.
The Dothraki would have survived, for a given value of the word, in ragtag bands and small groups here and there. If they kept getting good rolls, they might even truly be able to come together into a cohesive Remnant, able to survive and endure, if not thrive as they once did. If they did not get good rolls, they'd find themselves increasingly hunted down, confined into smaller and smaller spaces, forced off their lands and into smaller and smaller groups, their children taken from them and assimilated elsewhere … remind you of anything?
I will also put forward what was going to be the next round of voting options, along with notes about how things might have progressed:
The world is changed. You can feel it in the water, you can sense it in the earth, you can smell it in the air. Magic is here, and everywhere around you. But those who are not attuned to the weave of the world go on much as they have -- full of their own comings and goings, focussed on their projects and individual desires. You and they have designs to finish together, and things to begin anew. It's tricky to focus on those sometimes, though, as Arianne keeps making bedroom eyes at you. Not too much longer, now…
[some selected options]
Martial (choose zero this turn)
Advisor: Stannis Baratheon
[ ] An Army of Some: While the campaign to exterminate the Band of Bastards was brief, you can't really be sending your Kingsguard every time a conflict or concern arises. You've been batting around the idea of a Royal Army, sworn directly to the Iron Throne, but you know that would be a tall order to get accepted by the Lords of the Realm. DC 100. Reward: you can begin recruiting for a Grand Army of the Seven Kingdoms. Many lords will be uneasy with the prospect. (100,000 Dr)
[ ] A Gold Standard II: The Goldcloaks are trained, now, but Aegon is still dissatisfied. A good knight is not quite the same as a good watchman, he's realized. The position has its own unique requirements … has anyone ever tried writing this down? DC 70. Reward: increase quality of the Gold Cloaks to Professional, may improve the city's attributes. (20,000 Dr) (locks for 2 rounds)
Once the second round of Gold Standard I completed, you would be able to take (basically) Advanced Goldcloaks, and make the City Watch something to be proud of serving in.
The Royal Army concept is one that I was and am deeply uncomfortable with, because of the inherent implausibility of it in the setting. But people did argue for it, and I would at least let you try.
Intrigue
Advisor: Oberyn Martell
[ ] From Forth the Fatal Loins: The Usurper is dead and buried, and so are his (alleged) legitimate children. But what of the illegitimate? Just because Lord Stannis has renounced his claim to the throne doesn't mean that a bastard of Robert's with sufficient charisma and cunning couldn't make a claim and find themselves with backers against you. You know of a few, but only a few. You'll task Prince Oberyn to find the rest. DC 75. Reward: discover the natural-born children of Robert Baratheon, their personalities, and locations. (7,500 Dr)
[ ] The Lonely Dragons: At the moment, the entirety of House Targaryen consists of you and your infant children, your sister, and your nephew (and your other nephew, Snow). Is it possible that there's more family out there? Your father and brother may have had bastards, and who knows how many female relatives married into other families? Your knowledge of your family tree is woefully incomplete, and you would know more. DC 50/75/100. Reward: learn more about the branches of the Targaryen family, ??? (15,000 Dr)
Filling out the family tree is something I had hoped to be able to do, especially for how thin on the ground House Targaryen and any potential heirs are, and House Baratheon is in even worse shape.
Learning
Advisor: Grand Maester Jacaerys
[ ] The Iron Throne: You have an odd sense about the Iron Throne, like there's something to the smallfolk tales that it's cursed. It's definitely not just a throne of half-melted swords, you know that much for sure. You'll have the Grand Maester look into it. DC 80. Reward: gain information about the Iron Throne, ??? (1,000 Dr)
[ ] The Dragon's Bane: Wildfire was an obsession of your father, and of other Targaryens before him (Aerion 'Brightflame' makes your father look sane in contrast). You like a bit of fire and destruction as much as the next dragon, but maybe there is something else here? DC 60. Reward: gain understanding of wildfire's properties, potential uses (10,000 Dr)
[ ] Silence Lay Steadily Against the Wood and Stone: You know hardly anything about Summerhall, one of the darkest marks in your family's long and checkered history in Westeros. Your brother went there often, but spoke nothing of it; your father wouldn't hear the name in his presence; your mother wept at the very thought of it. Perhaps an impartial third party, an observer like the Grand Maester, can give you the salient details – what the buildup was, what if anything went wrong, anything you don't know but should. DC 75. Reward: information about Summerhall, ??? (7,500 Dr)
[ ] The Night was Long and Full of Unknowns: With the insights of Lady Melisandre, comments of Maester Aemon and observations by Grand Maester Jacaerys, you have a strong inkling that a second Long Night is on the horizon. But the first was long ago, and much that should not have been forgotten is lost -- history became legend, legend became myth (oh, that's rather good, you should write that down). So much has been lost, you don't even know how long ago it was. It'll be a tall order, but you need to try to sort the fables from the facts. DC 95. Reward: information about the Long Night is gathered. (15,000 Dr) (This project must succeed 3 times to be completed)
So, the Iron Throne is functionally an amplifier; it builds on what is already there. So, in this timeline's Robert, it took his paranoia and retributive nature and turned them up to eleven; with Viserys, it would over time begin to make him more prone to complicated schemes and endeavours that would see this universe's TVTropes page titled "Viserys Gambit" instead of "Xanatos Gambit".
Wildfire is something that, if it was handled properly, I was willing to let people try and test some industrializing with. For instance, if you treated it as a stand-in for nitroglycerin, you could try to mix it with a stabilizing agent to create dynamite. I personally was intrigued by the possibility of developing firearms if you used it in a similar manner as nitroglycerin for making smokeless powder.
Summerhall, I speak on a bit further down.
The Long Night, I speak on a bit further down.
Heroes (Pick one task each)
Daenerys Targaryen
[ ] The Dragon in the Dome: Ned has been impressed by her work during the Dragonpit Trials so far, and wants her to stick with it. He thinks she could make a real difference in getting widespread acceptance of the trial's results, maybe get some recalcitrant lords to internalise the new world order. Diplomacy, DC 65. Reward: Dany helps conclude the Dragonpit Trials, may gain traits.
[ ]Shadows of the Past: For good or ill, the most powerful and consequential of Targaryen women have always had martial skills. To advance her in this arena, you'll have Dany train with Ser Bonifer. Martial, DC 55. Reward: increase Martial, gain combat-related traits. (Free)
[ ] Sisters in Scales: Dany has never been one for the traditional route, and neither have you. She's forged good relationships with the Sand Snakes, and they could probably teach her things that would never occur to Ser Bonifer. Martial/Intrigue, DC 40. Reward: increase Martial and Intrigue, may gain combat-related and intrigue-related traits. (Free) (assigns the Sand Snakes to Dany for the round)
Dany's character advancement would depend on the path you chose for her; she could become a diplomat and poet like Rhaenys, she could become a warrior in the vein of Visenya … or she could become something different. I personally found myself hoping that people would want to pursue the third option, and see what a Dany influenced by the Dornish could become.
In general, I didn't have any major shipping plans for Dany; I was teasing at Willas Tyrell and was willing to entertain Robb Stark if people could find a way to have them meet, but I wasn't attached to anything. Hell, if people decided that she and Aegon made a good pair I wouldn't have fought it (though I would have looked at it a bit askance).
Aegon Targaryen
[ ]A Mind that Burns: The Prince of the City is smart, and received much of the training for kingship that you never did. You would have him improve on those subjects, as they will not only benefit his work with the Goldcloaks, but when he becomes a lord somewhere as well. Learning, DC: 50. Reward: increase Stewardship and Diplomacy, gain related traits. (Free)
[ ]Children of the One: Ser Aegon has been making inroads with his half-brother, Jon Snow. He would like your permission to bring Jon into the City Watch, and to begin the process of making him a knight. Diplomacy, DC 50. Reward: recruit Jon Snow to the City Watch, squire him to Ser Aegon (Jon Snow becomes a Hero Unit). (Free)
[ ]The Shape of Dreams: Many Targaryens across history have been touched by some kind of influence beyond the mortal coil – some dream of the future or the past, some discover things in the present beyond their ken, some speak with the dead … Ser Aegon wonders, in his few quiet moments, if he has inherited something of this from his father. Willpower, DC 60. Reward: increase Willpower, may gain related traits. (Free)
[ ] Along the Nascent Echo: Summerhall sits long ruined, a scar on the Stormlands and a sobering reminder of your house's fragility and fallibility. Ser Aegon has some curiosity about the place, given his father's connection to it, and he's dreamed of visiting it sometime. Reward: ??? (2,500 Dr)
So, before I dive in, a quick aside: the vote option names for Aegon are all quotes from Battlestar Galactica. I dunno why they fit so well for me, they just did.
I dunno how "Ser Aegon and Squire Jon" would have gone, but I bet it would have been at least interesting.
Depending on how much Egg dived into the magic stuff (and how well he rolled) he might improve his "what will happen in the next five seconds" combat foresight ability, he might begin to figure out magic-empowered strikes, or (with a nat100) some other crazy shit I hadn't thought of yet.
Summerhall, as the "Silence Lay Steadily Against the Wood and Stone" name under Jace's options might imply, is Westeros' version of "The Haunting of Hill House". If Aegon (and whoever joined his party for that adventure) survived, they would have discovered that the ruins of Summerhall have been warped by its own magic to protect a clutch of seven dragon eggs deep in its bowels. (I had a plan where, each turn you didn't select the Summerhall option for Aegon, each of the eggs rolled a d100, starting with a DC 10 to endure, adding 5 each time after that. Maybe all seven would be viable when you arrived; maybe only three; maybe none. Not that this would be intended as a punishment for not choosing the option, just a realistic thing of "time and the world both progress regardless of what your players do" kind of DM/QMing. And, regardless of other events, Summerhall would resist any and all attempts to end its haunting, violently if necessary. Aegon would want to find a different place to live and call home.
Beshka the Basilisk
[ ] A Lovely Goatherd: You've heard the songs, same as anyone else. You'd like to get some firmer details, and if there is indeed a martial-minded woman in the Vale, you know just who to send. And, because she possesses the subtlety of a dragon in a glassworks, you know just who to send with her. Martial/Intrigue, DC 40. Reward: Beshka and Asha Greyjoy will go to the Eyrie and see what they find, and maybe what they can return with. (2,500 Dr)
[ ] A Golden Cloak: Ser Aegon is quite fond of Beshka, and would be happy to bring her into the City Watch, if she and the King would be amenable to it. She would be the first woman in a golden cloak, and there could be some resistance within and without, but it could also smooth the path towards women as knights or in the Kingsguard. Martial, DC 60. Reward: Beshka joins the City Watch, lowers DC of Brothers and Sisters by 10. (1,000 Dr)
[ ] A Future Unknown: You can ask or order Beshka to do things, but what does she want to do? What life does she see for herself? Willpower, DC 50. Reward: ???
I talked a bit previously about the Lovely Goatherd. Mya Stone would have been a potential friend and compatriot of Beshka's, depending on how things went. In her future, maybe she would have joined the Queensguard, or Beshka's mercenary company, or (this idea amused me greatly) she could fall head over heels for Aegon, and be surprised (though pleased) by him being equally into her.
This specific vote would have greatly shaped the path that Beshka's story took from here. Myself, I am shipper trash, and if a Queensguard was formed, Beshka would have taken it on and tried mightily to talk Asha Greyjoy into joining her. With lucky rolls and character development, I had liked the idea of Asha, Beshka and Asher quietly falling into a nice little triad that kept their relationship to themselves and kept getting into barfights in places no one would recognise them. But she could also have become a goldcloak, or have gone to the Iron Islands with Asha (when Balon inevitably croaked and Asha inherits in this potential future) and been her 'woman-at-arms' on Pyke, or she could have founded a mercenary company serving Viserys' interests directly … Beshka had an open-ended future, something that scared her, a lot. Asha made things feel not scary, and Beshka was not gonna let that go without a fight. (I am shipper trash. Sue me.)
Arianne Martell
[-] The Queen is recovering from delivery of the twins, and will be available for actions in three months.
When she became available, these would have been her task options:
[ ] An Honorary Viper: Arianne loves her uncle and her cousins, and after spending so much time with them, has picked up a lot of their skills. While she is well-suited to the life of a Queen, she does sometimes miss getting her hands dirty. (Allows you to take on an additional Intrigue Project) (Please specify which one when voting)
[ ] A Learned Lady: Your Queen is even more well-read than you, and she might be the only person in the Red Keep able to keep pace with the Grand Maester. She has impressed him more than once, and he seems to possess none of his order's usual disdain for women's intellect. (Allows you to take on an additional Learning Project) (Please specify which one when voting)
[ ] A Mother's Mercy: The giving of alms is an old and popular tradition. The people would be honored if their Queen were to give them bread from her own hands. Diplomacy, DC 40. Reward: Increase Happiness, improve relationship with the Faithful (500 Dr)
This upcoming turn, partway through I had planned an interlude for Viserys, where you would be deciding the fates of the men in the Dragonpit Trials, but I had another vote planned for that as well.
I had been laying the groundwork for Tyene Sand to possibly have a more intimate place in your family's life. In canon, she's very close with Arianne (it's heavily implied, if not outright stated, to be sexual) but we never see Tyene, or any of the Sand Snakes, really, outside of the worst time in their lives in canon: their father dead, their uncle and sort-of-stepmother unsupportive, consumed by vengeance and bloodlust. I wanted to explore what they would be like in a good place, and very quickly Tyene found a place in Arianne's company in my writing.
So, Tyene has very old and very deep-seated feelings for Arianne to say nothing of her loyalty here (if Arianne gave the word, Viserys would be dead before she finished talking). She likes Viserys, likes that he's clever and that he's good to Arianne (the fact that he's a looker doesn't hurt anything) so Tyene would be amenable to getting closer (and, in general, Viserys feels much the same towards her). Arianne would feel conflicted, because she loves Viserys and also loves Tyene, but would have to choose the father of her children if push came to shove, and she would fear her children's safety/legitimacy if this relationship became known. That said, she would want to try. So, it would be down to the word of the king: a "yes", a "no but please don't leave", and a "no, leave my sight forevermore" would all have far-reaching consequences -- some of which would be good, I wanna be clear! But so too I would want to be clear, this would not be a casual thing to enter into lightly.
Below this spoiler, I have (as listed) the long-term, big-picture stuff. Like the Long Night, Summerhall, the truth about Petyr Baelish, etc. Oh, and a couple of mostly-finished interludes that would be ready to go for specific contexts.
Going into this, I didn't know how long I wanted it to go. I knew that I didn't really want to drag it out so long that Viserys' children could become actual characters, so at the higher end I was thinking a quest of 25-30 turns – in narrative, that would have worked out to about 6-7 years.
One of the earlier whispers was that things were tense in the Vale, to the point that Jon Arryn had gone off and slapped Lysa hard enough to break her jaw. This, as some suspected, was not entirely true; things are tense, and Lysa does have a broken jaw … but she threw herself down the stairs when Jon wouldn't keep Robyn from Viserys, intending to say Jon did it to her. She kind of overplayed her hand, though, and landed hard on the side of her face. A future interlude option would have let you see them interact somewhat, with Jon exasperatedly saying "Are you going to throw yourself down the stairs again, Lysa? Not that I didn't treasure the silence, but I'd as soon have witnesses this time."
You also would have discovered, if you selected that interlude option, that Petyr Baelish is indeed in the Vale, disguising himself as a maester and monitoring Jon Arryn's communications. Baelish is a smug snake after all, and has far too high an opinion of his own cleverness; he thinks you'd never believe that he would hide in so obvious a place, and that he's covered his tracks too well for you to find him there. Incidentally, Baelish was instrumental in preventing Lyanna's letter from reaching its intended recipients; the Rebellion was more or less entirely his fault, a gambit to bring down Brandon Stark that paid off beyond his wildest dreams.
I was going to spend a lot of time, like probably too much time, dropping hints about Grand Maester Jacaerys. The scarf he wears comes from his mother, a bastard of House Velaryon – its colour helps his eyes look not as violet as they would otherwise. Lucky for him, though, he inherited his eyes from her; his father's eyes were mismatched eyes—one dark blue, the other bright green … just like Jace's grandmother's. Jacaerys Waters is not a secret Blackfyre, as I was quietly trying to drop tiny fakeout breadcrumbs in the direction of; he is a secret Seastar, the only descendant of Shiera Seastar and Brynden Rivers. Since his father's death, Jace has been charged with one task, the task his father believed was their cause and purpose: to find the last traces of the Blackfyres, and purge them from the world.
Eventually, he would find the last of it; Gerold Dayne, the Darkstar, in this world is the last of the line; his mother was a secret Blackfyre, found as an infant by a soldier that couldn't bear to murder an innocent. The Darkstar extracted this from his 'adoptive' grandfather on his deathbed, learning why his grandfather had been so eager to marry her into the Daynes (so that her appearance wouldn't be questioned, and the line could quietly go extinct). Worse yet, Gerold Dayne has a lead on the location of Blackfyre the sword, and he has nothing to lose.
When the Dragonpit Trials came to an end (sort of a midway-point in the upcoming round) you would be presented with choices about how sentencing would go (I mean, guilt was kind of presumed, right?). If you assigned Dany to continue with the trials, that would have helped shape how things went. In particular, you would have been present for her to directly interrogate Tywin Lannister about his crimes. Regardless of her role, however, Aegon would come to you and ask that Tywin Lannister be given life imprisonment and kept in King's Landing.
Your vote would have looked like this:
Lesser Participants (smallfolk & hedge knights, agents of the regime but not decision makers):
[ ] Pardon
[ ] Imprisonment/hard labour (5 years)
[ ] Take the Black
[ ] Execute
[ ] Write-in
Conspirators (bannermen & minor lords, 'middle management' who on occasion got their hands dirty):
[ ] Pardon
[ ] Exile
[ ] Imprisonment/hard labour (10 years)
[ ] Take the Black
[ ] Execute
[ ] Write-in
Paxter Redwyne (former Master of Ships, architect of the sea campaign and persecution of dragonseeds on the islands and coasts):
[ ] Pardon
[ ] Exile
[ ] Imprisonment (life)
[ ] Take the Black
[ ] Execute
[ ] Write-in
Gyles Rosby (former Master of Coin, the one who kept other Crownlander lords in line and the genocide well-funded):
[ ] Pardon
[ ] Exile
[ ] Imprisonment (life)
[ ] Take the Black
[ ] Execute
[ ] Write-in
Tywin Lannister (former Hand of the King, ordered the deaths of Elia Martell, Rhaenys and Aegon Targaryen):
[ ] Pardon
[ ] Exile
[ ] Imprisonment (life)
[ ] Take the Black
[ ] Execute
[ ] Write-in
Real talk here: I had no expectation that anyone would actually vote to pardon or exile Tywin, so that left three options (unless someone crafted a bloody brilliant write-in). If you kept Tywin in the city, it would have an impact on him (and his plans and his worldview, really) and he would, as a gesture of goodwill to Aegon, give up Amory Lorch. If you sent him to the Wall or planned to execute him, he would have enacted his final revenge:
Jaime Lannister stood before the doors of the Black Cells, one hand resting on his sword pommel and the other in the pouch at his side. It was not the first time he'd stood there, nor the tenth. He thought it might be somewhere close to a hundred, or even past that by now. Every night after his duties were done, he stood before these gates, and every night he failed to walk through them. But the end of the year was close at hand, and it was becoming harder to justify not speaking to his father. Gerion had advised him to speak to him, to not let things fester between them as things had with him and his brother. But Gerion had long since left for the Long Lake, and still Jaime hadn't found his way into the dark.
Not for the first time nor the tenth, Ser Warrek appeared at the gates and spoke to him. "Good evening, Ser Jaime."
"Good evening, Ser Warrek."
"Is there anything I can do for you this evening?"
'Not now, thank you' was what always left his lips. Ser Warrek would then offer his pleasantries and depart, and he'd stand there for another stretch of time before returning to the Tower of the Hand and diving deep into work to distract himself.
Except this night, he said, "Yes."
Warrek looked about as surprised as Jaime felt. However, the gaoler found his words first. "What is it that I can do for you, my Lord Hand?"
He couldn't be certain that it was Warrek's intent to fall back into bantering, as a way to ease Jaime's tension, but if it was he deeply appreciated it. "To start, you could forget your sense of formality, for how long we've known each other now."
"Of course, my Lord Hand." Definitely intentional.
"…I suppose you could also let me past," Jaime managed to get out.
"To what end, ser?"
Well, of course Warrek was going to be dedicated to the job and by the book. His simmering frustration with the man's devoted attitude to such niceties likewise helped ease Jaime's internal tension. "To see my father in his cell, King's Justice."
Warrek smiled an easy grin, and Jaime chewed his tongue a little. "As you wish, my Lord Hand. Please come with me." The King's Justice indicated a torch mounted in the nearby wall, and Jaime took it. It was a short trip from the gates to their destination, but each step felt like a mile to him, and the anticipation was building to an uncomfortable anxiety inside him.
Yet, all too soon, they had arrived to a thick door made of steel and wood, with a small grate at the height of an average man's head. Warrek spoke in hushed but clear tones. "Beyond here is a series of cells, and your father is in the cell at the end, on the left. He is the only man in this section. For your safety and his, we require that you do not touch or approach the bars of his cell. Do not pass anything to him that we have not pre-approved. If you are to pass him something, use the slot at the side of the cell – it cannot be opened at the same time from both ends. If he attempts to pass something to you, do not accept it. Can you work with these rules, my lord?" At Jaime's nod, Warrek pulled out a particular set of keys, and unlocked the main door. "I will wait here for you, my lord, allow you some privacy. Please respect that trust in turn by not breaking mine. We have the rules for reasons." He then held open the door, and Jaime passed through.
The door closed and locked behind him, and Jaime took a deep breath before walking down the hall. If anything, he felt like the isolation, the absence of other prisoners, made the walk more unsettling. One empty cell after another passed by him as he walked, and in the back of his mind Jaime wondered who had been kept here in the past, which kings had seen these cells filled completely. He knew full well Aerys didn't bother keeping people here when he could burn them, and Robert hadn't kept many prisoners while he served the fat usurper.
His musings fled his mind completely as he came to his father's cell, a torch burning by the door to the cellblock illuminating this cell to a reasonable degree. Within, his father stood in the centre of the small room, almost at attention. Tywin Lannister looked paler than he had aboveground, but that wasn't a surprise, nor was the burning intellect behind his eyes. What was a surprise was the rest of his physical condition, as it seemed Warrek maintained a reliable schedule for food and didn't neglect his prisoners. But for the paleness of his face and the simplicity of his garments, hardly any change had passed for his father. He could see the small, unadorned table and chair that occupied one side of the cell, a few books placed upon it. Sparse but serviceable beddings were placed on a stone ledge on the back wall, likely part of the recompense for aiding Ser Aegon's investigations in the past months.
"Ser Jaime," Tywin greeted him. "It's a privilege to see you."
"Is it?" Jaime managed to say with the smallest of pause.
"Of course," he answered. "A Kingsguard has precious little spare time, the Hand of the King even less, and now you've taken on both roles. Therefore, for you to take the time to see me, I'm almost obligated to view it as a privilege."
"I didn't think you would want to see me," Jaime admitted.
"In the first hours, first days, perhaps I would not have," Tywin said easily. "But an unexpected benefit of the time and isolation has been a certain peace of mind, a patience I did not anticipate." Tywin paced behind the bars slightly. "So how are you finding the work? From one Hand to another."
"Exhausting," Jaime said, eventually. It was odd, like they were falling into the same rhythm and understanding they'd had when he was pretending to be the Lord of Casterly Rock. As if nothing had changed. "But rewarding. It feels good to make a difference, to be able to change lives so easily, and without killing anyone to do it, either," he added with a wry smile.
"Anything else about it?" Tywin asked, probing.
Jaime hesitated, before responding, "I've been finding that it keeps the mind from wandering."
"Wandering to what?"
"The Maidenvault," he answered honestly. His hand instinctively clenched on the tiara in the pouch at his side.
"I am sorry," Tywin said, and Jaime nearly lost his footing in surprise. His father looked and sounded sincere. "I know how much she and the children meant to you."
"You do?" Slipped out before Jaime could restrain it.
A short, humourless laugh came from his father. "Insight, my son," he gestured to his surroundings, "is what I have instead of a view." Not for the first time, Jaime felt like his father could see right through him with that gaze. "I have little to do with my time, but to think. And I suspect you're right that having things to do keeps the mind from wandering off its path. Perhaps," he said evenly, "if I had been doing less, or spent more time with you as children, I would have seen it sooner."
Jaime couldn't breathe.
Tywin met his eye. "Did any of the children belong to Robert?"
A long moment passed before Jaime spoke. "The youngest might have been. I can't be certain."
"In hindsight, I'm amazed no one else caught on," Tywin said lightly.
"You don't think anyone did?"
"It's unlikely." Jaime let out a breath as his father continued, "If someone else suspected, let alone knew about it, they would have tried to extort Cersei, or me. I never heard from anyone, and if she did she never informed me of it. It is inconceivable that someone could find out about this, and not attempt to profit from it. Save, perhaps," he added, "men like Stannis, or Lord Arryn. I imagine they would feel honour-bound to inform the king, and that clearly never happened. So, I am left to believe that either no one knows, or that any who do lack sufficient proof to make themselves a problem."
"I suppose that is a relief," he said as his grip on the tiara lessened.
"If I could ask a hard question of you," Tywin looked from the pouch to his son, "I would ask if you think that day is the worst memory of your adult life?"
"I could agree with that," Jaime answered, finding the honesty refreshing. "But I hope to have a lot of adult life ahead, so I can't say for certain."
"Oh, I think you can," Tywin sighed. "When it's the worst memory, one that nothing will dislodge, you know. It's the memory that changes who you are, what you do, the things you think about or find yourself capable of." He looked his son up and down. "It isn't hard to see those changes in you, since that day."
Jaime nodded, "I suppose you have a point."
"What is your worst memory from boyhood?"
"Mother's death." The answer was easy, though he didn't feel completely certain in it; he knew it was the worst memory Cersei had from childhood, and the two of them shared so much it seemed obvious to have the same. Yet he wondered if perhaps, for him, there was another experience he'd simply pushed aside because it didn't matter as much to her.
"I'm not surprised. It's the worst memory of my adult life; it stands to reason it would be the worst of your life at the time," Tywin commented. "How do you think that changed you, contributed to who you are now?"
Jaime blinked. "I don't know," he said truthfully. "I've never taken time to think about it."
A corner of Tywin's mouth twitched. "I remain unsurprised. You never did think too much about anything, let alone yourself or why you are the way you are, and that was before you took on two of the most stressful jobs in King's Landing. I, on the other hand," he indicated his walls, "have no work to be distracted by and nothing but time on my hands. Introspection passes the time as easily as anything else, and it has proven valuable to me."
"If you don't mind my asking," Jaime leaned against the wall, "what memory of childhood comes to mind for you?"
"In my childhood, it was the day that your aunt Genna was wedded to Emmon Frey."
"Really?"
"Yes," his father nodded. "I'm sure you know I spoke against the betrothal, in full view of my father and his lords," and Jaime nodded in turn – his aunt was never shy about telling the children this to show the love for his family and personal strength that Tywin had even at that age, though he and Cersei had only truly believed the second half of that. "What you do not know, what even Genna doesn't know, is that on the day of their wedding I went before our father once more to try to stop it."
"You're right, I've never heard this," Jaime agreed.
"Neither has anyone else," Tywin sighed as he sat down on the stone ledge. "I found him in his solar that morning, watching the sun come up over the Westerlands. I did everything I could – I tried to reason with him, I tried to pressure him, I tried to bribe him with obedience and respect, I tried to threaten him that I would bankrupt and ruin the family if he went through with it. When nothing else worked, I even fell to my knees and pleaded with him not to do it." Tywin scowled as his eyes looked far beyond the walls of the cell, into memory. "He never said a word. He just stood there and took everything I said, everything I did, and then said we needed to get ready for the wedding as if I had just walked in the door. He walked out of his solar, and never said anything to me about it. I don't know if he was too stupid to understand anything I said, or if he was too weak-willed to do what was necessary, but I suspect it was both," Tywin snarled, five-and-forty years of heated emotion breaking through the distant contempt with which he'd always talked about Jaime's grandfather before now. "He sent me away soon after that. I imagine he hoped I would learn to be cowed and compliant in the presence of the Royal Family. Or perhaps he believed sending me away meant I could no longer try to make him think and do more than he was capable of. He needn't have worried. I didn't think him capable of anything after that day."
For a moment, Jaime just stared, completely taken by surprise.
Tywin took the silence as an opportunity to continue. "I learned that day not to rely on any power that was not my own. I learned that if I knew something needed to be done, I would need to do it myself. I learned that no one gives you power: you have to take it."
"In hindsight," Jaime echoed his father, "that explains a great deal. About you, how you ruled, how you raised us. I suppose time will tell what influence events have on me."
"Indeed they may," Tywin said as he looked up, an expression Jaime couldn't name on his face. "I want to know something, Jaime. Was any of it real?" At the blank stare he received, Tywin continued. "Taking my seat. Listening to my advice. Being Lord of Casterly Rock. Was there ever a time that that was real for you? Or did you mean to move against me the entire time?"
Jaime's answer was a long time in coming. Eventually, he asked, "Can both be true? Can I have known I would need to do what's right, what's necessary, and still have been genuine in taking your counsel and listening to your advice?"
Tywin chewed his tongue for a moment. "If you meant to keep the seat I vacated for you, perhaps. Even as furious as I was with you, I could have looked past it … if only you stayed in the seat. But you abandoned the responsibility I gave you. You abandoned the privilege I gave you. For what? A misplaced sense of self-righteousness?"
"To serve our king," Jaime answered easily for the first time in a long time. "To make things right, to see justice served. To help a friend find peace, move forward."
His father looked away from him, staring at the cell wall as if he could stab through it with his eyes alone. "You look like my son, but you sound like Ned Stark." From anyone else it could have believably been a compliment, but Jaime had no trouble hearing the malediction in Tywin's voice. "In hindsight, perhaps that shouldn't surprise me so much: you're both well-meaning, short-sighted fools who chose the wrong friends."
"That all depends on perspective, Father," Jaime said with a dismissive sneer. "I murdered his father and left his brother's wife and daughter to die, yet I am the king's closest and most trusted friend. You, who kept your hands so very carefully clean but spilled the blood of Elia and Rhaenys nonetheless, who played the game of thrones and never once missed an opportunity to gain advantage … you sit in these cells, alone and powerless. The closest thing you have to an ally is a prince who handles you like a half-lame hunting dog he isn't sure he wants to keep." Even at his worst he was never his sister's equal in this particular skill, but nonetheless Jaime knew well how to convey smug superiority, and convey it he did. "Remind me which of us made the wrong choices, which of us is the fool?"
"It's very easy to believe you've made the right choices when you're on that side of the bars," Tywin hissed. "And it's easy to be condescending when you think you have all the power. Especially," he added, "when you lack the knowledge and experience to see the long view, of why I made the decisions that I did."
"Or you just have too many ways of justifying your mistakes to yourself," he scoffed. "Who knows, perhaps it is the curse of Lannister men, to one day find out your father isn't as smart as you or he thought." Jaime couldn't resist adding one more barb. "To be there in the moment you are most disappointed in him, and come to know you have to move beyond him."
Were he a child, or indeed a young man still, he would have immediately believed he had gone way too far, for how still his father had become. It felt like a long time before their eyes met again, and when they did Jaime saw no hurt or anger burning in his father's eyes, but an icy chill from the deepest winter's night. Tywin rose from the stone ledge as he spoke, and Jaime felt unsafe in the room despite the bars between them. "I am nothing like my father, Jaime. Even now, even in these cells, I possess the willpower to do what is necessary."
Hairs on the back of Jaime's neck stood at attention. "What is it you feel to be necessary?"
"To see my family taken care of, handled," he said imperiously, "in all meanings that implies. I will not see my brothers defy me or my sons usurp me, and face no consequences for their actions. That is why I am going to see your uncle disgraced, and your brother alienated from everyone named Lannister breathing free air. You see," Tywin folded his hands behind his back, "your uncle Kevan needs to either dry out or drown himself, and if what remains of his son being sent to him doesn't set him on the necessary path, then nothing will. Your brother is going to receive a raven, which will inform him of the truth of his wife, and the truth of your role in that sordid tale. At the same time, a catspaw who was in my employ to watch Gerion's family is going to receive a raven, telling him to kill the whore."
Jaime blinked. Once, twice. Then he sighed aloud. "I think I should talk to the King, see about having you confined in the Tower of the Hand, under my supervision. Clearly the isolation and darkness has been getting to you, that you're imagining such a plot and an ability to see it through. How would you even think that you could do it?"
For the first time in months, Jaime saw his father smile. It was a cruel, vicious thing that he knew well, but had not experienced it being directed at him before. "Heh. 'Do it'? I am not the villain of a folk tale or a mummer's show," he chided. "Do you truly believe that I would explain my intentions to you if there remained the slightest possibility you could stop me?
"I did it three days ago."
Once again, Jaime found his jaw working wordlessly before thoughts came along to be voiced. "How could you possibly do any of this from a Black Cell?"
"Even at my lowest, Lord Hand, I am not friendless or powerless," Tywin sneered. "And even as surprised as I was by your actions against me, I had taken some measure of precaution before coming to King's Landing. You and your conspirators were so eager to take my word for it that Amory Lorch perished at the Trident, but why? None of you saw a body, none of you knew his face." Jaime felt the blood drain from his face. "I had placed him in the City Watch, thinking I might want a useful tool in King's Landing if I could not rely on any others. It's remarkable how well that moment of precaution has paid off. It took him some time to manouevre himself into escorting someone into the Black Cells, but he managed it, and received instruction from me. He snuck me paper and ink, and then took my messages to where they needed to go before he left the city. I wish you luck in finding him," he finished with a sneer that wouldn't have looked out of place on the Mad King himself. "Even I don't know where he's going, if you hoped to have someone torture the information from me."
Despite himself, Jaime found his mouth gaping like a fish ripped from the Blackwater. "What could you hope to accomplish with this?"
Tywin sighed, his unblinking gaze tearing into Jaime. "Even now, my son, even with holding my ancestral blade against me and conspiring with my enemies, I cannot bring myself to challenge you in trial by combat or see you killed some other way." Green fire burned in his father's eyes. "But I can see you hurt. I can take from you what you have taken from me – my family, and my ability to preserve and protect them. I can make you feel as powerless as you hoped to make me, and I can rest assured that there is nothing you can do to stop or thwart me."
Jaime stepped back, feeling a terror he hadn't felt in almost fifteen years. "You're mad," he managed eventually, and prepared to leave the cell block.
"Perhaps," his father agreed. "But I am no Mad King – you cannot stab me in the back and believe you will face no consequences for it." Eyes that usually looked like chiseled emeralds, solid and unyielding, somehow took on a look of red in the firelight, and Jaime could not repress the instinct to flinch away from that merciless gaze.
"I know what Tyrion's worst memory from childhood is. I wonder what his worst adult memory will be." That cruel smile returned once more. "It's amusing to think I will have had a major part in each of them. One more thing you and I have in common, Ser Jaime." As Jaime walked away from the cell, a final taunt echoed behind him. "I don't expect that I will be able to see the ways that this shapes and changes Tyrion. But I can rest assured, neither will you."
So, yeah. If things went south for Tywin, things were really gonna go south for everyone else. There would have been rolls to see just how well he succeeded but, absent a nat1, at a minimum Tyrion would learn the truth about Tysha, and that wouldn't burn the bridge with Jaime so much as douse it in wildfire and sic a dragon on it. It might seem like meanspirited QMing, but in my opinion anything less would have been dishonest to the character; if Tywin Lannister is going down, he's going to take down everything and everyone else he can grab ahold of on the way. So I really hoped people would decide to keep him around as not!Hannibal. I really, really hoped.
I don't know what precisely I was gonna do with the Others, the War for Dawn. I feel like there's been so many takes on it at this point that I'd have to really work at it not to put out something derivative or recycled. I do know it wasn't gonna be for a while yet; to give you a look behind the curtain on this, in the previous quest the Others were rolling quite terribly for their ability to get their shit together and get on track. So, Winter was not coming on the same timetable as canon. But it was coming. And when they rolled well enough to get back on track (these rolls would be done at the end of each 'calendar year', so for example this might have come to you at the end of 301 AC) I had part of an interlude prepared for that:
"We should return to the Wall," Gared spoke up once more as the snow fell heavy upon them. "The wildlings are dead."
"Did you see them dead with your own eyes?" Ser Randyll Tarly asked, a snarl moments away from his face as ever, ready to report when needed.
"If Will says he saw them dead, then he saw them dead." Gared's voice was as sure as if he'd seen them himself. "His word's good enough for me, or any other black brother."
"Not for me," Tarly said.
I all but said as much, you miserable cunt, Gared wisely kept to himself, though he could tell that Will read the sentiment on his face plain as day. Instead he said aloud, "Will is among our best scouts, been on the Wall near five years now and ranged beyond it hundreds of times. The only thing we'd see that he didn't is more snow atop them since he left."
"That might be," the older lord replied. "Or it might be you both want to go back, mission be damned. If they're dead, I should see it for myself."
"We have a long and hard ride waiting for us," Gared pointed out. "A full twenty days, maybe longer. And the snows have only gotten deeper."
"Did the master not make sure you could count?" Ser Randyll glared. "We've ridden a fortnight tracking these vermin, no longer."
"And we rode twelve of those days in clear weather," Gared answered, "the last two in ever-worsening snows," he decided to hold himself there before he could voice, you daft Southron shit what's never seen a real snowbank in his life. "This weather moving south means we'll take half again as long to return, if not more. We've only so many rations among us, and I've not seen anything worth the effort to hunt it in a week." If they went too much farther, they were going to have to hope they could forage, or else make it back half-starved. Gared knew he and Will could probably manage it, godsawful as it would be, but the stuck-up once-lord had longer odds.
"All the more reason to confirm the wildlings are dead then," Tarly said with a smile as chilly as the wind around them. "They must have some supplies, which we can use to supplement our own. If they are indeed dead."
Gared knew the disgruntled once-lord wasn't worth his trouble, that Thorne would be delighted to make Tarly miserable once he was back at the Wall, but that was a long ride away, and he'd been tolerating Ser Randyll's personality for two very long weeks. Forty years in the Watch, man and boy, and there had been very few who could set him on edge the way that Tarly did.
…
…
A shadow emerged from the dark of the wood. It stood in front of Tarly. Tall, it was, and gaunt and hard as old bones, with flesh pale as milk. Its armor seemed to change colour as it moved; here it was white as new-fallen snow, there black as shadow, everywhere dappled with the deep grey-green of the trees. The patterns ran like moonlight on water with every step it took.
Will heard the breath go out of Ser Randyll Tarly in a heavy grunt, almost a gasp. "Seven defend us," the deposed lord breathed out. He threw his cloak back over his shoulders, to free his arms for battle, and took his greatsword in both hands. It was so cold, it felt as though the wind froze and fell to the ground like snow.
The Other glided across the snow on feet that made no sound. It bore a longsword that could only be called such for being long and clearly a sword. No iron, no steel, no bronze or any such metal worked by a human hand was in that blade. It glowed, a faint blue shimmer independent from the moonlight. Thin, crystalline and somewhat see-through, like a great icicle almost, Will knew just from looking at it that it was sharper than any razor, let alone an icicle.
To his credit, Ser Randyll met it bravely. His fingers flexed across the handle, frost cracking from his knuckles. "No. No farther." He stood at guard, blade waiting for action. In that moment, Will thought, he could see the bitter once-lord fade away, and become a true Watcher on the Wall.
The Other stopped. Will could easily tell that it stopped by choice, not by threat. From his height, he could see the creature's eyes; ice blue, like the shimmer of its blade but bluer, deeper, and more luminous in every way. They fixed on Tarly's family blade, watched the moonlight flickering cold across the metal. For a heartbeat, he dared to hope.
They emerged silently from the shadows, twins to the first. Then three of them. Then four. Ser Randyll might have felt the cold that came with them, but he gave no sign that he ever saw or heard them. Will had to warn him of their presence. It was his duty. And his death, if he did. He shivered, hugged the tree, and kept his silence.
The pale blue-shimmering sword sliced towards the once-lord.
Ser Randyll met it with his prized Heartsbane. When the blades clashed, the sound that came was not metal on metal; what came was a high, thin sound at the edge of hearing, painful and cutting to the bone. Tarly checked a second blow, a third, and then fell back a step. Another flurry of blows, and he fell back again.
Behind him, to right, to left, all around the clearing, the watchers stood patient. Faceless. Silent. The shifting patterns of their delicate armor making them all but invisible in the wood. But they made no move to interfere.
Again and again the swords met, until Will wanted to cover his ears against the strange anguished keening of their clash. Ser Randyll was panting from the effort now, his breath steaming in the moonlight, his beard was white with frost. The Other seemed unwinded.
Then Tarly's parry came a beat too late. The pale sword bit through the ringmail beneath his arm, and the once-lord cried out in pain. Blood welled between the rings of his rent armor. It steamed in the cold, and the droplets burned their way into the snow. Ser Randyll's fingers brushed his side. His worn leather glove came away dripping with red.
The Other said something in a language that Will did not recognise; its voice was like the scraping of its icy blade over bone, and the words felt taunting.
Ser Randyll Tarly let loose his fury. "For the Reach!" he shouted, and he came up snarling, lifting his longsword with both hands and swinging it around in a flat sidearm slash with all his weight behind it. The Other raised a parry that was disinterested, almost lazy.
Then there was a crack. A sound like when the ice of a winter lake breaks beneath your feet, both with the dull fracturing thud you felt as much as heard, and the gut-churning bowel-loosening sensation of 'oohhhhfuck'.
Then came a screech so shrill and sharp that Will nearly lost his grip in the tree, so great was the pain and desire to cover his ears, and he watched as a blade climbed its way out of the Other's chest from behind. Pale blue blood hissed and sizzled as it ran down the creature's armor and seemed to melt all in its path to the snows below. It dropped its sword to scrabble ineffectually at the shining steel blade travelling through its chest, but its fingers steamed and flowed like its blood when they touched the blade.
Then the blade seemed to wrench itself out of the creature's chest in a spray of blue and white, and the Other collapsed as its form shrank and puddled, revealing bones like frozen milk as its flesh swirled away as a mist on the light breeze.
Behind the ruined creature stood a man wrapped in old wools and leathers, wearing a black cloak with red running through, and wielding a sword that looked like fire in his hands. Even from a distance, Will could see its crossguard waved and moved like golden flame, and the same flame erupted from its pommel.
"No," said the man with a clear and pleasant voice. "For the Living."
He raised his sword then, to a guarding position. "To me, crow; stand and fight!"
Ser Randyll staggered a bit, but came to stand with his back against his rescuer's. Heartsbane stood aloft in a shaky mirror to the other man's blade, but Tarly's grip remained firm.
The four watchers were angered, or at least Will thought they might have been. Who could tell with such faces? But when they moved in, there was a hesitance that the first had not possessed. Were they afraid of the man, or of the sword? Their conduct gave him no answer, for they seemed to focus their attention on the injured one, like wolves preying on a sickly elk while trying to avoid the sharper, stronger one's wrath.
The stranger was fast, faster than Will knew himself to be, faster than Tarly had been even before his injury. The sound of their blades crashing against those freak ice blades came harsh and constant as the watchers turned active combatants.
Two kept the stranger busy while the remaining two harried Ser Randyll. The old knight paid dearly for each moment he stayed up, his movement slowed, his greatsword ill-suited for close combat. Their pale blades sliced through his ringmail like it was just another layer of flesh, and Tarly's blood began to paint a ring around him.
Then another crack and piercing scream came as the stranger got past the guard of one Other, and drove his sword through its middle. It cut like a hot blade through soft butter, and even as it melted and misted away the stranger forced his sword out the creature's back, letting two halves fall away from each other. The remaining three howled an awful sound that could only be rage in their inhuman voice. The stranger twisted his longsword around in a flourish, flicking blue-white blood into the snow and into the face of his remaining opponent, and as it took a step back he gave it a wicked smile.
His smile fell when a pale sword ran Ser Randyll through, and the old knight staggered and fell to one knee.
Tarly's choking sounds looked to make the timid Other bold again, and it came in with a high slash against the stranger. Far from intimidated, the stranger stepped inside the Other's guard with a courage Will could not dream to possess, and shoved his blade through the Other's surprised-looking face. Its pale blade fell to the ground, shattering in an awful noise. The Other fell to its knees as its head melted down its torso, then to the ground and was still.
The stranger turned back to try and aid Ser Randyll, but the third creature fast engaged the stranger and forced him back. It looked to be trying to hold him off long enough that the last could finish off the bloodied knight, then the two of them could take on the stranger with an advantage.
Will could just barely see Ser Randyll's face, pale and pained. There would be no saving him, and everyone there knew it. Then he saw a feral, bloodstained grin cross the dour man's face. Tarly grabbed the cold blade that impaled him with one hand, shaking but tight. Frost crawled up his glove and his arm, and he cried out in pain. But his grip held firm. And he pulled the blade farther into himself, yanking his killer off-balance.
With a final roar, Ser Randyll Tarly gave an awkward overhead swing downwards, Heartsbane heavy in his remaining hand but driven true and into and through the creature's skull.
Both of them fell to the ground.
The stranger took advantage of the moment, ducking and slashing his blade through the last one's legs with a powerful swing, before carrying his momentum through to an overhand stab. He brought the sword down hard into the creature's chest, and after a final scream, the clearing lay silent. He went to Tarly's body then, and looked to be confirming the man was dead.
Then Will's breath froze in his throat as the stranger looked up and directly at him.
The man smiled and called in a pleasant voice, "Come you down, crow. There's none but us here now."
Will didn't want to move. But his muscles were cramping and his hands were numb from the cold. And if this stranger meant him harm, there would have been no need to call him down. Will felt certain that a blade such as his could probably have brought down his tree faster than he could get out of it.
He climbed down by the light of the half-moon, taking a chance to look behind and see if he could spot Gared and the horses. He could not. On the ground, he saw that the stranger had collected Heartsbane from Tarly's body, along with the dead man's gloves. Held out in offering, the stranger said, "He's got no use for them, now. You do."
Will took the gloves, and tried to ignore the frost and blood that marked each of them.
"How did you know I was there?" Will asked before he could think of anything else to say.
The stranger smiled. "Crows don't travel alone, the birds or the men. And when one's pecking about on the ground, there's one up high keeping watch." He took a rag from somewhere on his person and wiped his longsword clean. Up close, Will could see it was a bastard longsword, with precious stones set within its crossguard. Golden flames were sculpted into the crossguard and the pommel below the handle, and the steel had a dark glow to itself in the moonlight.
"Who are you?" Will asked.
"Mance Rayder, you son of a bitch," Gared surprised Will as he came out of the wood, hand ready on his shortsword's handle.
Will blinked in amazement as the so-called King-Beyond-the-Wall Mance Rayder squinted at his companion, before grinning again. "It's good to see you, too, Gared. You old goat."
To Will's continued surprise, Gared took none of the offence he had to words half as harsh from their commander. "Is this going to come to trouble?" the old ranger asked.
"Trouble already came, ensued, was overcome," Rayder answered. "How much did you see?"
"I heard terrible noise, and when it stopped I came up to see you talking Will out of his tree."
Will found his voice to say, "I saw everything. I couldn't help it. I couldn't help him."
Rayder put his rag away. "You'd have been killed quicker than he was, lad, and it would have been a death for nothing."
Gared's grip on his shortsword's handle tightened. "Ser Randyll is dead?"
"Not by my hand," Mance said, a hand coming away from his blade to be held up, placating-like.
"I'd need to see about that," the old ranger grunted. "Where's his body?"
Will turned to point to where Tarly's body was.
It was gone.
Rayder swore. "I thought I had more time, they don't usually get up this fast."
Will gaped at him like a trout caught from a stream. "They don't what?!"
Mance turned back to him briefly, as if to answer, then gripped his sword fiercely and swung hard towards Will.
He only just ducked out of the way, into a roll towards Gared, and came up with a dagger in his hand.
Words left him again when Ser Randyll Tarly stood over him.
His armor was a ruin, a hole gaping in the centre of it. His face was grey-white from blood loss.
His eyes were open. They burned blue like the Others' eyes.
And then the burning blue faded as the head lolled off his shoulders and fell to the ground.
Rayder brought his blade down again, cursing once more. "I just cleaned this, too." He brought out the rag again, and wiped black blood from the longsword.
"What in seven hells was that?" Gared said. His voice shook as much as the shortsword in his hand. Will had never seen the man look frightened before, and it frightened him almost as much as the dead man trying to kill him had.
"That," Rayder replied, with a forceful wipe, "was a wight. Those what die beyond the Wall don't stay dead anymore, not without burning or destroying the body. The Cold Ones raise them up again, mindless foot-soldiers in an ever-growing army."
"The Cold Ones?" Will's voice returned to him at last.
"Others, Cold Ones, White Walkers, take your pick," Rayder explained. "Different names for the same demons. Quiet these past thousands of years, but no longer. Their numbers are growing again, and more dead rise with each new Cold One's touch on the earth."
Will wanted to question. He wanted to deny, to say that was a tale of fantasies from below the Wall and a legend that no one had any proof of. But he had seen them himself, seen a soldier raised again by their power.
"We have to warn the Watch," Gared said, putting his blade away.
Mance turned to Gared, handed him the greatsword Heartsbane. "Do that, if you can, and take this back with you. Course," he added, "they're just as like to think you killed him out here, took his things and came back with a good story so you could get away with it. So run south and warn the Wall, hope they believe you … or join me."
"Join you?"
"I'm raising an army, too. Gathering all the free folk I can and getting them far away from the reach of the Cold Ones, and those that want to fight them fight with me." Rayder held up his longsword with one hand, pointed to Heartsbane with the other. "Steel like that, like Dark Sister here, it hurts them. Same as dragonglass, if you can manage to fucking find any up here. I could use someone who knows how to use that thing, Gared. I could use a friend. And," he looked to Will once more, "a scout good enough to track my folk when they don't want to be found would be a good get, too."
"Do we have a choice?" Gared asked.
"So long as you're living, yes," Mance said. "Don't turn on me, living or dead, and we can part ways like we never saw each other. Or you can come with me. I can't offer you much, can't offer warmth or safety or much in the way of friends. But we know what's out here, what's coming. And we'll stand next to you when it comes."
As Will watched him, Gared looked at Mance a long time. Then he went to Tarly's twice-fallen body, took the scabbard from it, and slipped Heartsbane into it before fixing it to his back. He looked Mance Rayder in the eye, and he nodded.
An early rumour had you hearing that a man with a red cloak and a sword like fire was moving about the far north. That was carefully phrased so you could wonder if Bloodraven was somehow wandering around, or astral projecting, or if a Red Priest was up there, but at this time, no: Mance Rayder has Dark Sister, and he is working on Bloodraven's behalf. Dunno where that would end up going, but it was a wild idea and I had planned to have some fun with it.
I do, however, know what I was gonna do with Azor Ahai, the Prince that was Promised, AND "The Dragon must have three heads": there would not be one Hero, but Three: Aegon and Daenerys Targaryen and Jon Snow. And nobody was going to be stabbing anybody in the chest, either. The three of them, together, are the Promised.
So. What you have there is collected almost 20,000 words of what I had planned, what the little twists and secrets and possible futures were. I hope there were surprises, that they were good ones, and that at least some of the possible futures sounded believable, even pleasant. I hope all this answers some questions, and that the interludes, unfinished as they are, make for good reads. I enjoyed them going back and reading through as I put them in here. Bit bittersweet, though, in that I wish I could still write like that. This writing, meanwhile, is getting frightfully close to the 20,000 word mark, and a lot of it is fairly evidently stream-of-consciousness me being like "I don't want to be self-indulgent" / "this sucks and I'm sorry" / "...oh,godsdammit" ... so, erm, yeah. Gonna wrap it up (perhaps depressingly on-theme) not in the neat little tied-up bow or the high note that I'd try to write with, but sort of scatterbrained, disjointed and confused: authentic me.
I'm going to be around, I'm not leaving SV, so if there's anything you want to know about, you not only can but by all means should ask; the worst I can do is say "Damned if I know."
