The drumbeat blurred, becoming a long, feverish, never-ending pounding. The Mead seemed to leap forward, its bow splitting the water, spray bursting up white as milk.
On deck, the sea wind tugged at Gendry's black hair as he stared at the rolling outline of land in the distance: the Disputed Lands. Fertile. Chaotic. Right now, the best choice, and one of the few choices left.
"My young friend. The road ahead won't be easy." Old pirate Saan of Lys came up beside him, holding a cup of warmed wine.
"Decades ago, my ancestors rose here. The Ninepenny Kings swore their alliance beneath the Tree of Crowns." The old pirate pointed toward the Disputed Lands.
"Too bad it ended in a rout at the Stepstones," Gendry said. Everyone knew that story.
"The future is uncertain," Saan said. "If you find you can't hold this place, there will always be room for you on my smuggling ships."
"I'm grateful," Gendry said.
He truly was. In the Disputed Lands, they couldn't operate without a fleet behind them. And later, whatever they seized—Fire Herb, spices, liquor—would need Lysene channels to sell. Still, the old pirate's network was too vast for comfort. Gendry couldn't fully trust him.
"I have only one piece of advice for you, Commander," the old pirate said. "In the Disputed Lands, gather your strength into a single point. Make too many enemies, and you won't last."
"I'll do my best," Gendry said.
He didn't want to turn all Three Daughters against him. But freeing slaves meant going to war with the slaveholders of the Three Daughters, and that would shake the world. The conflict ran too deep to avoid. And if he grew strong enough, perhaps even the old Lysene pirate would end up fighting him one day.
On the ship, the manor slaves who had been brought along to haul Fire Herb began tearing the wooden tags from their necks and flinging them into the sea.
"Eleven!"
"Twenty-two!"
One after another they ripped the tags away. Those pieces of wood were shackles, the very word for their lives. With the tags on, they were slaves. Without them, they became fugitives, hunted at will, with an even crueler fate waiting if they were caught.
"Have you thought it through?" Gendry asked them again.
"The worst that can happen is we die," the slaves said. "But going back to Fire Herb Manor? That's worse than death."
"I can't give you much," Gendry said. "Only freedom, and even that may be temporary."
He stood before them, short black hair stiff in the wind, and lifted the tags they'd cast off. Then he hurled them into the sea.
"Freedom! Freedom!"
"Freedom! Freedom!" the slaves shouted back, their voices rising together.
They dropped to one knee at Gendry's feet.
"From this day on, freedom is our faith!"
The Wolf Pack banner snapped overhead, and the slaves cheered again.
"Abolitionist! Abolitionist!"
This was the reality in Myr. When a Magister died, his power didn't pass on. It vanished, carved up by the other Magisters. If these Fire Herb Manor slaves were handed to a new master, their fate would be the same as ever—maybe worse.
Their cries carried out over the open water, filled with tears, raw excitement, and something like fire.
"I'll lead them into a different fate," Gendry swore to himself.
"Free Company," he thought, looking over them. They were a mixed lot—men and women of every shape and size—but now, now they were his most promising force. Sellswords in the Disputed Lands were hard to bind with loyalty. Freed slaves were another matter.
Once freed, they had nowhere left to go. Their only road was to cling to him with both hands. They had no schooling, no soldier's training, no battlefield craft, but they were his army.
Saan watched Gendry in silence. Slavery had endured this long, and there had always been those who tried to overthrow it, to rise up against it. Most ended in failure. Where would this young man reach?
The smuggling ship put Gendry and the Wolf Pack ashore along the coast. From there, they carried their Fire Herb and made their way back to Fire Herb Manor.
Magister Casso's power melted away like ice in the sun. Fire Herb Manor now belonged to the Wolf Pack.
"First, we have to address our assets," Qyburn said. "Everything the Wolf Pack owned in Myr—property, deposits in the Bank of Myr—will be seized outright by the Myrish. Fortunately, part of our gold is still in the Wolf's Den, and we have some funds deposited in the Iron Bank of Braavos."
"That's something," Gendry said after a moment's thought.
Sellswords lived on the edge of a blade. They earned quickly and spent just as quickly. The Northmen among them were more frugal by nature, which was the only reason any surplus remained at all.
"The Disputed Lands are no fine place," Qyburn went on. "But it's the only ground we have to stand on."
"The only example we can look to is the Ninepenny Kings from decades ago."
"I know of them," Gendry said. "They were defeated by Barristan the Bold. After Duncan the Tall and the Short one both died at Summerhall, he was chosen as a temporary commander."
He had heard the stories of that war, of Barristan's charge that turned the tide.
The Ninepenny Kings had been formidable in their day.
"They were an alliance of pirates, merchants, Sellswords, and exiled knights," Qyburn said. "Though they failed in the end, their path was sound: seize the Disputed Lands, then Tyrosh, then the Stepstones. If Barristan had not reversed the battle, the Band of Nine might have carried the war to Westeros itself."
"These regions are tied together," Gendry said. "The Three Daughters, the Disputed Lands, the Stepstones, Dorne. If we take estates in the Disputed Lands, we're bound to offend the Three Daughters."
"And Dorne as well," Qyburn added. "The Ninepenny Kings fell in part because Dorne sided with the Iron Throne. We're in the Disputed Lands now. If we expand into the Stepstones later, we'll need to speak with the Dornish."
Dorne was crucial. The Stepstones lay like the middle of a serpent. Dorne and the Three Daughters formed its tail. In past wars for the Stepstones, the Iron Throne had been forced to fight from both ends, which was why those conflicts dragged on so long.
"That will be troublesome," Gendry said. "Dealing with the Dornish is like dancing with scorpions. And ever since the sack of King's Landing, they've hated both the Iron Throne and House Lannister."
"It is troublesome," Qyburn agreed with a sigh. "And then there is your identity."
When King's Landing fell, the war had nearly ended. Seventeen-year-old Gregor The Mountain, alongside Ser Amory Lorch, had bathed the Red Keep in blood. Gregor stormed into the royal nursery and smashed Prince Aegon, Rhaegar's infant son, against a wall, killing him. Before the child's blood had even dried, The Mountain raped and murdered Princess Elia Martell.
Though House Lannister bore the worst of the blame for that atrocity, House Martell's hatred did not stop there. They held both House Baratheon and House Lannister responsible.