Chapter 29: Three Brothers
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Half way through the supper capping a day spent in productive hunting, axe tossing, and wrestling, I rubbed my eyes in disbelief. I lingered in the dreary halls of Storm's End due to vague remembrance of Vhagar making a light snack of my nephew's dragon, drawn in by the chance to savor an appetizer of the feast of my terror unleashed. I came for light fare, and before my eager eyes approached a whole course in rain slicked riding leather.
Oh sweet sister, you send unto me the finest gifts so effortlessly. Onto my plate walked the Queen Who Never Was, and as Aunt Rhaenys gawked at the sight of me at the head of her kinsman's table, I mentally rang the dinner bell for Sunfyre and Cannibal.
"What a joy to be joined by my dear aunt in visiting the home of one of my most loyal and capable lords. Well met, Princess Rhaenys." I greeted the woman with a raised horn of wine, "Come join us. It has been a small and intimate celebration the last few days, but as soon my brother Daeron arrives ant this gathering will quickly become one of the biggest events of the year, made all the more grand by your arrival. Truly the gods love me above all others, to bring family together unasked and unexpected, but so welcome."
I watched as the old Princess composed herself. She possessed nigh flawless regal conduct, in many ways reminding me of my father at his best, that old school class that the younger crowd are still working towards and I was born with. She accepted the bread and salt that provides the necessary assurances that allow society to operate, and slowly approached the table and her offered place with a false nonchalance as her four man escort of Stormlander men at arms moved around her.
"Kinsman, Lord Baratheon." Rhaenys addressed the man to my right as he deadfish gazed at her with a perfect expression of boredom and annoyance, "I come on behalf of Rhaenyra Targaryen, Queen of the of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, with message." she reached behind her leather coat to produce a scroll that Boros waved away with one hand.
"Miss me with that Grey Rat faggotry, traitor." he dismissed her purpose, "You stand before the King of Westeros and speak treason. I'll be no party to it. Leave and shame my bloodline beyond my sight."
"Peace, Boros." I raised a hand to forestall him throwing the woman out, "The storm outside is quite something, and she is kin to us both. I hold her sins less against you than I do myself. Dine with us. The only queen we shall concern ourselves with is Meleys the Red Queen. Tell me, auntie, was that magnificent beast even bothered by the raging storm as she made this flight."
Rhaenys remained quiet as she worked through her confusion, almost keeping it entirely off her face. The servants moved Lady Baratheon and her side of the table down and set out a place for Corlys's wife. I watched the war behind her eyes as she calculated, evaluated, and assessed her situation with the placid grace and confidence of a true queen. I watched her desperately try to figure out a way out of this as she used the sacred laws to buy time.
"The storm bothered her not, for Meleys flies in the prime of her life. I; however, am well past it and felt every rough gust and icy drop harshly." Rhaenys answered.
"Aye, a fine creature indeed. Unbothered by rain coming down so thick and heavy as to barely see your hand held out before your face. I admit no small envy for your pairing of her." I smiled with my best approximation of fondness, "Alas, red was never my color." I put down my drinking vessel and clapped a hand on Gregor's shoulder, the boy making good on his claims of obedience and remained quiet unless addressed by me, "Princess, I introduce to you my son, Prince Gregor Targaryen. He is retarded."
Gregor fixed his vacant stair at her, not looking away until I instructed him to return to his food.
"I obey father!" he droned loudly before stuffing his face with fried cod.
"Retarded?" Rhaenys worked the word in her mouth.
"From the Valyrian: retardo." I offered explanation.
"I'm familiar with the word." Rhaenys smirked.
"Oh?" I sensed a delightful morsel coming.
Rhaenys cocked her head, and I saw the moment some form of the words, 'Fuck it' rang out in her mind, "What else would we have called your father growing up?"
Many within earshot gasped and looked to me wide eyed, my love for my father famous. Before dear Borros burst an o-ring in empathetic fury, I threw my head back and laughed, long and hard, even placing a hand over my stomach. Soon other laughs followed, nervously, and rightfully so for I snapped my head forward and roared, "What the fuck are any of you laughing about?"
I eyed the room full of pale and terrified faces, then turned back to my auntie. "A tragic lack of decorum among these folks, but what else can be expected of Andals." then I chuckled softly, "I thank you for that Princess, I treasure that small piece of my father's history."
I felt the pair closing in, so I forestalled her reply by continuing, "My father taught me that we Targaryen's don't truly control our dragons. He viewed the idea that we control dragons as an illusion we sell to these people to prop up the sentiment that we are closer to gods than men. What do you think about that?"
Rhaenys didn't need much time to formulate a response, "He never lacked for reasons to get called Retardo." she scoffed.
A wide grin split my face as I timed the next statement, "Right or wrong, at least it offers some vague deniability for what comes next."
Meleys's scream vibrated the hall as Sunfyre and the Cannibal carved out the curtains of rainfall diving onto her. Sunfyre's impact shook the whole castle like an earthquake, the hard headed beast proving there is no such concern as 'terminal velocity' to him. Cannibal took his sweet time joining the fray, his cowardly cunning easily felt through our short lived and forced bond. Sunfyre's dense bones, muscle, and viscera absorbed the meteoric impact that shattered the wing and ribs of the Red Queen, and I felt his joy as he began ripping and tearing into the old she-dragon.
"Meleys!" Rhaenys rose in despair.
"If I don't really control my dragons. If it's just an illusion… then I'm not breaking guest rights." I announced as I leaned forward and rested my cheek on my knuckles, settling in as Sunfyre's emotions provided me a vague understanding of the events outside. I felt the awe of the dive, the shock of the impact, and the satisfaction of his claws as he recovered in just a moment and his wings became instruments of death. I felt Cannibal's exaltation as his fangs locking in around thigh and hot blood filled his mouth.
The Princess wailed as she fled the hall, her sobs barely audible over the shrieks and death cry of her dragon. When Meleys finally lay silent and Sunfyre roared in victory, and that clever bastard Cannibal joined him, I reached out for my horn and poured one out for the fall of the Red Queen, then threw down the empty vessel and shouted, "Another!"
My command brought back motion to the dismal service of this dreary hall.
- Daeron -
The youngest of the three royal brothers pulled his head out of a water barrel, wiping his eyes and hair back. The soot and ash hardly bothered him physically, but spiritually it felt as if his sins coated his entire body. In the rippling surface of the murky water he saw himself an ashen specter that no one else saw.
How he wished himself more simple minded like his nephews, unplagued by the guilt of bringing fire and blood to an entire kingdom. He wished himself more steady like his brothers, lamenting the weakness he knew they lacked. Aemond could set himself to burning an entire kingdom by his lonesome, and only stop because someone stopped him. Aegon could carry the whole world on his shoulders, the weight of lives nothing to him. Daeron tried to banish the doubts in his heart, but the sight of the ashen specter looking back at him in the settling water of the barrel mocked him with the truth. He lacked the inner strength of his brothers.
Unable to look any longer at the monster in the reflection, Daeron looked about the Westerland encampment. Today the Lannisters replaced the Targaryens in the action of cleansing the Iron Islands. Daeron and his brothers burnt every boat and fortified structure in the Iron Islands outside of Lonely Light, the last of the Iron Born only spared their fire due to the vast distance involved and the lack of coast to easily navigate to them. Daeron did his duty, and now the Lannister men-at-arms would chase the remnants into the mines and caves that riddled the rocky islands and complete the purge. They also continued the unenviable work of weeding out the survivors who hid amidst the freed thralls.
All that lessened the burden of guilt he felt was breaking the chains placed on the working people of these islands, ending the thin legal fiction that allowed the practice of 'thralldom' to continue here despite the firm anti-slavery position of the rest of Westeros. He'd never seen such battered and deprived people in his life, and though the slaughter left his spirit in a pit of blackness, the freedom of these people served as a light to guide him back from his suffering.
"Hu-HUUUU! So tight!" one of his nephews howled into the night causing Daeron to cringe and turn away from the tent the howling came from.
Many a filthy and downtrodden woman offered themselves to him and his nephews as spoils for casting down the Iron Born, but Daeron's stomach recoiled at the thought. He felt shallow, for rejecting them based on appearances, and if he closed his eyes and breathed through his mouth perhaps he too could have gotten to the business of restoring the Valyrian nation, but by the gods he lacked the will to do so. His smoothed brained nephews lacked any such qualms, so at least the woman folk received the seed they needed despite his weakness. He considered revising his opinion of his nephews, but the hoots and hollers possessed the ring of truth to them, no fakeness.
Filthy degenerate apes, the lot of them.
-Aemond-
The second brother narrowed his eyes as he simultaneously felt suddenly proud of Aegon and disappointed in Daeron, a welcome distraction to the drudgery of escorting his mother and the other politically very important people in their faction to the Blue Keep by way of the Mander starting in Tumbleton. He felt shackled moving Vhagar at the speed of a royal wheel house, and a caravan piled high with the loot of King's Landing. Thousands of calvarymen accompanied the glacially slow procession, but the sight of his brother's ships anchored down the river from the town caused one corner of his lips to turn upward.
Aemond landed Vhagar ahead of the calvary column and dismounted, even his strong voice unable to carry well over the distance atop the massive she-dragon to any listener on the ground below. The knight captain at the head of the formation kicked his legs for more speed out of his warhorse.
"Send a rider ahead to demand Lord Footly and his household to meet us outside the town to swear fealty to my brother, the King." Aemond commanded smugly, firm in the understanding that the Footly's finally caved to Rhaenyra's pressure and offered up themselves as her first foothold in the Reach.
He grit his teeth when he remembered he'd placed his money on House Cockshaw being the first traitors from among their powerbase. He'd wagered on their position closer to the Riverlands making them more of a chaotic nature, but Aegon put his money on the Footley's. How bothersome.
When the rider returned with word of defiance, Aemond ordered up the trumpets and thousand man knightly choir to elucidate to those beyond the walls of Tumbleton of just whom they rejected before Vhagar's flames send them on their way to the Seven Hells. The few score of men-at-arms and hundreds of hastily conscripted militiamen stood no chance of repelling even mundane knights and men-at-arms of this convoy, let alone the might of the oldest dragon and her rider. Aemond's sharp eyes spied the shivering fear and barely maintained moral of the defenders whom startled at the brass horn calls beginning the anthem Aemond composed for his brother, and soon a thousand bass knightly voices joined his in triumphant song.
"~Across the skies of storm and flame,
Aegon rides where eagles dare not claim,
On wings of gold that blot the sun,
His dragon roars and kingdoms come undone.
No blade has touched him, no foe stands tall,
The greatest knight to ever heed war's call.
From Icy Wall to Summer Sea,
His banner flies where men are free,
A crown of fire upon his brow,
He bends knee to none, and never shall bow.
The blood of dragons courses true,
Aegon reigns, and all the world anew.
Hail Aegon, hail the Golden Flame!
Lord of sky and sword and unchained name!
By dragon's wing and iron will,
No queen shall rule while he lives still!
Aegon! Aegon! Let the delusions fall,
The king of knights shall answer no woman's call!
When winter howls and traitors scheme,
When jealous crowns would dim his gleam,
He laughs from high on Iron Throne,
And turns their plots to ash and bone.
Let matriarchs and dowagers wail,
His realm is his, and his alone to hail.
Hail Aegon, hail the Golden Flame!
Lord of sky and sword and unchained name!
By dragon's wing and iron will,
No queen shall rule while he lives still!
Aegon! Aegon! Let the delusions fall,
The king of knights shall answer no woman's call!
Forever ride, forever reign,
Aegon the Golden, unbound, unchained.~"
Upon final refrain Vhagar took flight to show the world the price of decadent arrogance.
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