"Whether he is a stray dog or a dragon-lord is a debate for the poets," Mills interrupted, his voice cutting through the bravado. "What we must decide is whether we continue this war."
He gestured vaguely toward the window, where the scent of ozone and charred meat still clung to the air. "The North Gate is a funeral pyre. This Aegon Targaryen is not his uncle Daemon; he does not play at chivalry. He strikes at the heart of our home, and he cares nothing for the names of those he turns to ash."
Lysandro leaned back, his fingers steepled. "Which dragon does he ride? The blue one?"
"No," Johanna answered, her voice regaining its sharp edge. "The cobalt queen belongs to the younger brother, Daeron. He is but six years of age, though his mount has seen twenty summers. Aegon rides the golden one—Sunfyre. It is a young beast, less than twenty years hatched, yet the whispers say it is a freak of nature. It stands twice the size of any dragon from its brood, though we lack the measurements to be certain."
Lysandro's eyes thinned into narrow violet slits as he processed the intelligence.
Daeron Targaryen. Six years old. His own daughter, Lhara, was five. A thought, cold and calculated, took root in the fertile soil of his mind. Johanna caught the predatory flicker in his gaze, and her own posture stiffened. In this room of vipers, she knew Banbaro was the loudest, but Lysandro was the one who struck without rattling.
"Does Master Lysandro have a proposal?" she asked, her voice laced with suspicion.
"I am a man of ledgers and coin, My Lady," Lysandro replied with a hollow chuckle. "What thoughts could a humble banker offer in the face of fire?"
He kept his true intentions locked behind a mask of indifference. Even now, he was weighing the price of Lys. If the city had to fall for the Rogares to rise, he would hand over the keys himself—provided the reward was a marriage alliance with the Iron Throne. A merchant did not buy the first silk offered; he waited for the market to bleed until the price was right.
"It is four dragons, not the Doom itself!" Banbaro spat, reaching into his silk tunic to produce a heavy roll of parchment. He slammed it onto the table with the force of an executioner's axe. "We have the blueprints for the scorpions. I have already drafted a defense against these winged demons. Here—the requirements for three hundred and ninety dragon-bolts."
He puffed out his chest, his eyes gleaming with the fervor of a zealot. "With these, the next time those beasts darken our sky, we shall not be victims. We shall be Dragon Slayers!"
Lys was a city built on the ruins of Valyrian indulgence, a former retreat for the Dragon Kings. When the Doom took the Freehold, the Lysene had risen up and slaughtered the dragon-riders who sought refuge there. Banbaro's lineage was long, but unlike Lysandro, who looked at dragons with a hidden, ancestral longing, Banbaro viewed them as vermin to be exterminated. He did not want to ride the wind; he wanted to pull the wind down to the dirt.
Lysandro and Mills pulled the parchment between them, scanning the figures. A moment later, Lysandro erupted into a sharp, mocking bark of laughter.
"Three thousand gold dragons for the raw materials of a single scorpion?" Lysandro looked at Banbaro as if the man had lost his wits. "And that excludes labor, the hundreds of man-hours for assembly, and the cost of maintenance?"
Johanna rolled her eyes, a look of pure exasperation crossing her face. "You might as well ask us to hand you the keys to the public treasury and be done with it, Banbaro."
The true cost of a dragon-bolt was barely three hundred dragons; even with the finest Myrian gears, it would not exceed seven hundred Lysene gold pieces. Banbaro wasn't just asking for a budget; he was asking for a kingdom's ransom in kickbacks.
"Prices are rising!" Banbaro bellowed, his face reddening. "The Narrow Sea is a war zone! I am offering you safety. Within half a month, I can have four hundred bolts mounted and ready."
The realization dawned on Lysandro and Mills simultaneously. Banbaro hadn't just drafted a plan; he had been stockpiling these engines in secret, waiting for a moment of peak terror to sell them at a ten-fold profit.
It was a bold gambit, but a clumsy one. Aegon's raid had been a warning. Unless the Triarchy provoked him further, they had time to breathe—and time to build their own defenses without lining Banbaro's pockets.
"Let us be reasonable," Mills suggested, his voice the smooth oil over troubled waters. "The burden of defense should be shared. We shall each be responsible for the construction of one hundred and thirty-five scorpions. The public treasury shall provide a subsidy of one thousand Lysene gold pieces per engine."
Johanna and Lysandro nodded in swift, silent accord. It was a fair division of the graft. Each would oversee a sector of the city, each would pocket a tidy sum from the taxpayers, and the city would be defended without one man holding the monopoly on power.
"Fine," Banbaro said, though he looked far from disappointed. "I shall take the eastern walls. One hundred and thirty-five bolts shall be deployed within seven days. The rest of the city's safety rests on your heads."
He stood to leave, a smug grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. He had five hundred of the machines already completed. He had sold a hundred to Myr for a staggering sum, and another two hundred were currently being moved to his private fortresses in the Disputed Lands.
Whether the Council bought his stock or not mattered little. He would take the treasury's gold to 'build' what he already owned, pocketing the difference. In the game of war, Banbaro Bazaan knew that the only true winner was the man who sold the swords—and the shields.