[Hey, Author here. Sorry for this week's delay! Unfortunately, I may not be able to guarantee a chapter next week. Though I may be able to get one out, it really depends on my circumstances.]
Rhaenyra stood at the edge of the Painted Table in silence, while the voices around her rose louder and louder like snarling dogs.
Frustration boiled in her. How long had she waited for this? A chance to pay back what was taken from her?
And, this time, no one was left to stop her.
Not her father. Not even those twins who found themselves gallivanting East all of a sudden.
"The Reach will never abandon Oldtown, not completely," Lord Bartimos Celtigar argued bitterly. "The Hightowers have buried their claws too deep. We can only hope that House Tyrell remains neutral…maybe then we could find a way to convince the lesser Lords."
"But the Westerlands will follow the Lannisters to the grave if need be," another snapped back. "Jason Lannister was never going to support the queen, especially not after his brother's been named Master of Coin. My Lords, we are outnumbered. Dearly."
"The Stormlands are uncertain still," Another attempted. "Lord Borros may yet be reasoned with—"
"Borros Baratheon can scarcely reason with his own cock," Daemon scorned as he interrupted. "The prick's sold his daughter to the Hightowers, what would possess you to believe he would aid us?"
His words brought a few uneasy chuckles to spread through the chamber before dying just as quickly beneath his stare.
Rhaenyra listened as her councillors bickered endlessly around the table, each voice trying to claw over the others.
Lords demanded caution while knights demanded blood. Some called for diplomacy, while others already spoke openly of executions.
At last, Daemon stepped forward once more, placing both hands upon the Painted Table.
"If the Reach, Westerlands, and Stormlands declare for the Hightowers, then our only viable path lies here."
His finger traced across the Riverlands.
"The Riverlords remain divided, meaning we still have a chance to turn them to our cause."
"Neutral?" Lord Celtigar scoffed. "Half the Riverlands will piss themselves the moment the Greens march on them."
"Which is why we move first," Daemon answered. "We will seize Harrenhal."
Daemon continued, "Harrenhal would grant us a foothold in the heart of the Riverlands. From there, we can secure crossings, supply lines, and even then, some. At that point, anyone with half a head on their shoulders would fall in line with our words."
"And with what men?" Ser Steffon Darklyn asked. "Dragonstone is not King's Landing. We do not command endless levies. I doubt we could muster anything to challenge The Usurper and his ilk."
"We hold Harrenhal until reinforcements arrive." Daemon's finger moved northward now. "The North will answer eventually. Once Stark men march south, we crush whatever resistance remains."
Murmurs spread across the chamber.
"Again, my Prince, how precisely do you propose we take Harrenhal?" Lord Celtigar pressed. "The castle is vast, the largest in the realm and heavily fortified. I doubt the Clubfoot or the Usurper would allow such transgression."
Daemon looked toward Rhaenyra.
She frowned faintly at first, confused by the glance.
Then…she understood. She understood exactly how Daemon was planning to take Harrenhal.
"You want us to use dragons?" She asked slowly.
Disbelief rippled through the room.
Several councillors merely shifted in place while others outright paled. Even those who had expected ruthlessness in this cause of theirs seemed unsettled hearing this.
Daemon merely shrugged. "Harrenhal was built to withstand armies. Not dragons. Balerion proved that point well."
Rhaenys frowned, hearing this as she stepped forward.
"To unleash dragons upon Westeros would be an atrocity," she said. "We used them against the Triarchy. Against Dorne. Against foreign enemies." Her gaze sharpened. "Never amongst each other."
Silence followed her words.
Rhaenyra narrowed her eyes as she watched a few fools even dare to nod along to her aunts' words.
Taking a moment to collect herself, Rhaenyra let her gaze drift to everyone in the hall. "Those who refuse to bend the knee to their rightful queen have already become traitors to the realm."
She forced her words to remain calm. "It is my greatest mercy that they are offered the chance to submit at all."
Rhaenyra saw the discomfort flash in some of their faces then. The panic of war about to unfold in earnest. The fear of the fact that this war may burn outside whatever pale expectations they had held.
Daemon, thankfully, almost looked amused. It seemed someone here had not found her thoughts to be too rash.
However, a voice cut through her thoughts.
"Your Grace." Ser Lorent spoke. "Whilst the Prince's idea is worthwhile to ponder, surely striking King's Landing would be the better choice in the matter."
"Go on." Rhaenyra raised a brow and gestured.
"If we were to mobilise the…dragons." He paused as he spoke the word. "Our weakness of levies could be ignored. No, not even ignored. Perhaps we would even have the advantage due to the number of dragons for our cause."
"Indeed…" Ser Steffon nodded. "As of yet, the Hightowers only have...three dragons to their name?"
"Yes. That pair have long left, leaving only..." Rhaenyra nodded. "Sunfyre, Tessarion and Vhagar."
A trace of disaster lingered on Rhaenyra's tongue as she watched some shiver at the mention of Vhagar.
"Then we could very well simply storm King's Landing. With Your Grace's dragons to take the fold and the Velaryon fleet to blockade the capital, victory would come to us easily." Ser Lorent announced.
"Need I remind you that Hightowers will not give King's Landing, they will fight till their very last breath." Another lord countered. "Worse, though fewer in number than ours, the city is defended by dragons of its own."
"And scorpions."
"And smallfolk if the Hightowers become truly desperate."
The gathered soon began to argue amongst themselves, as at the start of the council.
Rhaenyra felt herself growing incensed with every word uttered by the fools. "Enough!" She shouted.
"If we cannot decide, we may as well do both." Said Rhaenyra. "Daemon and the Princess Rhaenys will do well to take Harrenhal with a small host. I trust you can convince some of the Riverlords to follow our cause as you march?" She looked at Daemon as she spoke the latter half of her words.
"It shall be done." An arrogant smirk crawled up Daemon's face as he nodded.
"Then." Rhaenyra nodded. "I, along with Lucerys and Baela, will take King's Landing with the greater part of the host."
As expected, several voices erupted, shouting the same old nonsense.
You are the Queen; you ought not do this.
You are a woman; there is no need for you to take to the battlefield.
Rhaenyra did not deign to respond. She had already made up her mind, and there was little they could do to change it.
The capital…her home, would be strangled until it either surrendered…
Or burned.
A city of hundreds of thousands reduced to a pile of ash no larger than her person.
For a fleeting moment, she imagined dragonfire washing across it. Streets melting like wax. Flea Bottom is screaming beneath clouds of ash.
The thought should have horrified her.
Instead, she found herself wondering how long the city would burn before the Red Keep finally collapsed.
***
"You truly did interfere with the ritual…" Baelon muttered. "So? What is it? Have you achieved whatever you were scheming, you insensible fool?"
A low chuckle was all that answered him.
"You do not seem particularly scared," Kael'thir observed. "Nor worried. Do you truly possess such confidence that you can escape something you do not understand?"
Baelon sighed.
"No, perhaps not," he answered honestly. "But, I've made my choice, and I may as well just live through it."
Silence lingered briefly before another laugh rang through the void.
"Interesting."
Baelon rubbed at his temple despite lacking a true body within this strange place.
"Look," he muttered, "I've watched Tyrax rip apart sea monsters for entertainment, witnessed Balerion cannibalised by his own…whatever the fuck those things were, and then got turned into sentient smoke before being shoved into a dead tree."
He paused. "At some point, you just give up bothering to understand."
Kael'thir laughed harder this time.
"Oh, I really do like you, Baelon. A shame this had to be done."
"That makes one of us."
The darkness shifted faintly around Baelon, almost like something circling him.
"You are far calmer than Tyrax would have been."
"That lunatic would've tried punching you by now."
"He did once."
Baelon blinked.
"What?"
Silence followed his question, clearly a certain someone was not interested in answering.
Baelon contemplated for a beat before speaking again. "What exactly are you? I've done my own bit of digging these past few years, but I have found nought."
"At first, I had thought you were the God of Secrets and Prophecy, but…" Baelon shook his head. "It makes little sense. You simply could not have escaped in any form from the God-Kings rage when all the other Gods failed to do the same."
"So…again, what are you? Seeing that I've fallen into whatever trap you have conjured…consider it a dead man's pleading."
For the first time since the voice appeared, Kael'thir did not answer immediately.
When he finally spoke again, the cheer in his tone had dulled.
"A failure."
The answer caught Baelon off guard.
"You don't sound particularly sad about it."
"What purpose would regret serve me now?" Kael'thir replied calmly. "All creatures, man or God, will come to face failure eventually."
The fog trembled faintly around him.
"So…what is it that you want from me?" Baelon asked, eyes darting around in his surroundings.
Baelon heard nothing but silence as he awaited an answer. Unfortunately for him, he was not given a response as darkness surged around him, binding and tethering him.
He tried to shout but found he could not.
He tried to break free but found he could not.
Baelon felt something attack him. Not physically. No, it attacked his very soul.
'Dammit! What is happening?' He thought frantically.
He had expected to be attacked. Sacrificed even in some unknown ritual.
Not this. It was almost as if…he was being assimilated.
He found his vision receding from the familiar void as he was transported across a myriad of scenes. A myriad of memories. Some of his. The rest belonged to a familiar flaming titan.
'But why?' Baelon thought to himself.
Why Balerion?
As the pressure mounted in his very being, he felt as if his very sense of self was being eroded.
An indeterminate amount of time passed before one scene finally remained fixed before him.
Baelon found himself standing in a chamber illuminated by spiteful rivers of magma.
And at the centre of it all stood Balerion. Not the dying wretch abandoned beneath the warring entities born from the ritual.
This Balerion stood immense and terrible, his massive hand wrapped tightly around the throat of a familiar, decrepit figure.
Kael'thir.
The old god looked far smaller than Baelon remembered. Frail almost. His body flickered strangely, parts of him dissolving into black ash before painfully reforming again.
"God-king…you cannot resist fate. You are fated to die, your kingdom alongside you!"
Balerion's jaws parted slightly as smoke poured from within.
"Yet, I will try all the same, so…why resist?"
The voice rang clear in his head as Baelon froze.
Why did it seem as if Balerion's last words were for him?
"You know you cannot win," Balerion continued. "Fuse with me. Gain power beyond your wildest imaginings…and escape fate itself."
The moment Balerion spoke again, Baelon felt his thoughts slow. His breathing became heavier. Even his soul felt dragged downward beneath the sheer enormity of the being's will.
And suddenly Baelon understood why gods had knelt before this creature.
Worse, he was becoming increasingly certain some of the words were meant for him.
Fuse with me.
Fuse with me.
Fuse with me.
The words swirled in Baelon's thoughts as once again he felt an unfamiliar force entrench itself deep within his soul. Something vast. All-consuming. Even…divine.
Kael'thir suddenly laughed despite the hands crushing his throat, turning to look at Baelon with those vast, unfathomable eyes. "You see it now, don't you?"
Baelon's eyes widened. He...was beginning to understand everything.
"I was never the one you were speaking to," Kael'thir whispered painfully.
Molten cracks spread across the chamber floor.
"He needed curiosity, needed desire," Kael'thir hissed. "He needed someone who kept turning those pages and listened to his words…"
"And you mortals are far keener to heed the words of a frail old man than a tyrant."
Baelon felt shock choke him.
With dread, his gaze drifted from Kael'thir to Balerion and…
He met a pair of eyes deeper than any abyss he could fathom.