Chapter 6:
Jaehaerys oversaw everything.
It wasn't interesting work, but the more direct his involvement, the more it would be remembered by the men and the common people in the coming tournament when word inevitably spread further.
House Dondarrion received his arrival warmly, and Harmon offered him every resource in the effort to root out the so-called Vulture King. The marcher lords all gathered at the call to arms, and their men continued to arrive by the day. He wanted to have a decent number, but there was definitely going to be a limit of benefit regarding numbers against a smaller sized enemy force.
The bandits were not expected to be a particularly large group, and the longer they took to make their push, the more likely many would outright flee or simply go to ground and hide. One of their advantages was how fast they could effectively move, given his dragon Vermithor.
I can cover far more ground than they could ever ride or run.
A missive he'd sent to the Prince of Dorne was answered within the first few days of his arrival, as he worked to arrange things in Blackhaven.
Jaehaerys hadn't minced words, or offered any undue threats.
He simply requested everything that House Martell knew of the bandit group that had been raiding the marches. He was doubtful they had offered any assistance to the bandits despite the rumors and the claim by the Vulture King himself to the name. Even though there was some degree of historical animosity present between many of the Dornish people and those of the Stormlands, and obviously so regarding the Dornish and the royal family in general, it wasn't likely that the Prince of Dorne would be deeply involved.
Not with so little to gain and so much at risk.
He asked plainly to be sure that the Prince knew that people would suggest his implication, and that would make him take the appropriate steps to dissuade that. Even if the Prince had quietly offered any support for the Vulture King, that would at least force him to make a show and statement of things opposite. It would also make him be far more cautious on the off chance he had offered any support, which would result in less funding and a weaker group of bandits.
Still, I doubt it.
The Prince relayed only that he'd heard rumors of banditry in the mountains, but that was the limits of his knowledge. He expressed his gratitude for the warning, and ended the letter in as few words as might be possible to avoid offering his assistance.
That didn't particularly surprise him.
"Everything is as you asked, your grace." Rogar said, indicating a few points on the map spread out on the table in the room they'd taken control of to use as for organizing command. "We've assigned a number of hunters and scouts to search the mountain passes for signs of their presence. The Stoneway also has natural game trails in the lower hills, which we'll be checking as well."
Jaehaerys looked the map over, but there wasn't any new information yet. It would be at least a few days more until the scouts returned and he could pick the route he wanted to take.
He reached out aside and grabbed his cup, lifting it to his lips as he considered the passes in detail. Rogar was being thorough, a testament to the older man's experience. While they'd had their issues in the past, it seemed like his inevitable death and the desire for it to be in battle had tempered his edge.
"Thank you." He said finally. "Have you heard anything of your brother?"
It was a bit early to be likely, but it was a point of continued discussion between them.
"Nothing." Rogar admitted. "I've made it clear he may be among the bandits, and that if he is found, he should be bound and brought before us for your judgment."
It probably would have been better for Rogar for his brother to die quietly, without recognition, among the banditry's faces. At least, assuming that he truly had thrown his lot in with the bandits and not simply fled his brother's impulsive confrontation outright. Rogar's quarrel with his brother who had been cut from inheritance by the very late birth of a son wasn't a secret. The Lord of Storm's End seemed nearly determined to believe that his brother was involved with them, and while the exact details had yet to come to light, he wasn't inclined to disagree.
Jaehaerys hadn't gotten to where he was by ignoring coincidences that might be patterns. He could see a strange reasoning in a former lord of a region turning to rebellion and aiding others in taking it back. Or simply lashing out in the only way he could.
Not particularly smart.
If they'd had a decade or something to go unnoticed and build their forces and support, maybe the Vulture King would have had a leg to stand on. More so with the Baratheon helping him with knowledge of where to hit in the Stormlands and when to the maximum benefit. Realistically, it was always going to end one way though.
Rogar had done the right thing by bringing them to his attention early.
Denorro and Sorzo stood in stunned silence as I introduced myself.
The heat of my breath faded away faster by the second, carried on the wind. The black smoke of bodies burned washed out from the area of the road as a lingering, offensive smog where it traveled. Small fires still lingered, flickering and spreading slowly along the instantly dried grasses that covered each side of the path we'd traveled.
Afraid.
They were afraid.
Denorro's hands still hung at his side, and Sorzo was the only remaining swordsman who hadn't fled. His naked blade was in his hand, but he made no effort to lift it.
I recognized the shock, the awe. Even the fear, to a lesser degree. I looked away from them both, and focused my attention on the burned Dothraki. I'd learned the hard way a long time ago that my attention would only make it worse. It was better to ignore them, let them figure themselves out and reorient themselves.
They weren't the first people to suddenly find themselves in the presence of the dragonborn and not realize it until my voice was unleashed. My legend traveled fast, but that had its limits. That was another reason I made it a habit to shout as I approached a hold, and make it clear to the guards what they were dealing with before they bothered me.
From there, it would spread quickly through the hold that the dragonborn was present, and everyone would act appropriately. While Denorro and Sorzo likely didn't have a frame of reference for what I was, at the very least they had mages. They'd adjust, if given enough time to reconcile my lack of interest in them to be signs of their safety.
Or run.
Either way, I'd done my part.
I walked toward the fire.
The Dothraki at the front of my breath who had received its full force unimpeded had been burned to ash and blown away entirely. I could see where the horses and men had been by the differing degrees of darkness on the road, where I'd painted the vague, oblong shapes of their shadows.
Those men at the fore had died, burned and obliterated under the forceful ejection of the fire as close to instantly as could matter. They probably hadn't had time to feel the pain.
I walked a fair way through the path of destruction until I got to where the first bodies presented themselves.
Fragments of dark coals, ash in the vague shapes of people that had fallen from their horses as my fire washed over them. Some bodies were more distinct in their humanoid and equine forms, the ash having preserved their final moments. Horses fallen on their sides were mostly there alongside a number of men.
Little more than crude, black sculptures.
The heat of the road was tangible through my doeskin sandals.
The deaths were less clean the deeper into the column I walked. The heat had eaten more at those in the front, and the force had hit them harder. At the rear of their group, men and horses laid dead and burned all the same, but they were festering, boiling corpses blackened and weeping juices. In some cases, the force of my breath was enough to pile them up. In other spots along the edges of the road, the slurry of men whose blood had been boiled out of them oozed along as little streams of combined fluid.
There wasn't any movement beyond the flickering of hungry fire among the piles of the dead.
As good an opportunity as any.
My concern for scaring off my guide or risking confrontation with the people I'd met was already gone by the wayside.
My only other concern was the effects of my voice going beyond or outside what I'd sought. I possessed knowledge that was in some ways still valid, and in others warped obviously. Even beyond that, it was clear something about the way in which magic was worked was obviously different in this land I still had no name for.
Drawing upon my nature as a dragon had been the first and most extreme difference. That alone would have been a reason for some concern. More pressing was that the scales were still there. I suspected that they were still beneath my skin even now. I could feel that the might of my soul had not relinquished its hold. It wasn't just that what being a dragon was had been manipulated slightly beyond what I desired.
It was that it wasn't as temporary when enforced so powerfully.
It was possible that even something like forcing myself immaterial might literally remove me from the material world.
Permanently.
My fire breath was the natural safest option; I had already seen another dragon breathe fire without unfortunate effects. That was at least a comforting thought. Similarly, I'd reflexively fell back on my use of raw force when a dragon wanted to bite me and it hadn't had a negative effect.
Those seemed mostly in line with my expectations.
The command I'd spoken to bleed the deer's endurance had behaved slightly differently than I expected, too. In Skyrim, that intent and that word had been more like cutting away something's energy. Letting it drip something more immaterial than blood. Various forms of its life force.
With the deer, I was almost certain I'd taken in a little bit of what it lost.
It should be fine.
I drew in a breath through my nose, concentrating on the cold. My mind went to the absence, the quiet of change diminished.
"Fo." The sound echoed.
A glacial wind emerged from me with my exhale, the surging rush of cold washing over bodies as I turned my head to redirect it over the remaining fires. Ice spread where my breath lingered longer than a moment, crystals as sharp as razors forming up into varying spikes. I didn't hold it for long, and I didn't want to freeze the area over and make things harder on myself anyways.
I just wanted to cool it down a bit. Maybe even help to make it less offensive on the senses. Relaxing, I closed my eyes for a moment.
When I opened them, it was to the sound of footsteps.
I looked over at Sorzo who was walking ahead of Denorro among the dead. He glanced at me, and when our eyes met, I gave him an encouraging smile. I didn't have the words yet for safety or reassurance, so it was the best I could do.
Instead, I turned my attention to the remains. It was grisly business, but I was a man of basically no means and while the ones at the front of my breath had been completely ashed, and blown into the wind, the further back from the point of contact, the more… well, mostly whole and simply dead they were.
The stink of their flesh burning was worse here, though, because it hadn't been a complete burn in that way. It wasn't carried off in the wind. It was just a foul smolder.
I leaned down to check the fallen, still form of a man half-crushed by a horse. His leathers were blackened, charred, and almost none of the long black hair they all seemed to prize remained atop his head. He had no eyes; they'd burst. Whatever expression he'd worn in the final moments of his life, the flesh of his face was too burned to tell me if he'd still felt triumphant, or if he'd been in pain.
When I lifted his vest, it came away like peeling the skin from roasted chicken, taking the top layer of his tissue with it. I could see the open, cooked musculature of the body he'd once had. I winced.
Someone gagged audibly.
I looked up, one hand still holding the vest as Sorzo fought back his disgust. He'd been watching me.
Yeah.
It was one thing to see a man killed. It was quite another to see their cooked insides being opened up like roast meat. Even if I hadn't meant to. Denorro by comparison looked a bit squeamish but other than a deep, disgusted grimace, he didn't lose his stomach.
Good for you.
It didn't seem like they were as quick to flee my presence as the others though, so I had good odds of keeping my guide after all.
I cleared my throat, digging for my book and turning to sit on the dead horse after a second to feel that it wasn't going to collapse inward or something. In the process I noticed it had fallen on the man's bags that had been strapped to it.
Both companions' eyes returned to me, and Sorzo wiped a hand at his mouth.
Searching my writing for what I needed, I directed my attention back to where they were watching me. Given where we stood in the road at the end of the column, a fair way from the wagons without horses, I knew it would be a bit of a slog to do it on my own.
"Bow. Arrow." I said referencing the way to say the words.
Denorro and Sorzo blinked wordlessly at me, almost perfectly in sync. Sorzo glanced around separately, however.
Flipping a page, I made a motion with my hand, and added, "Coin."
I needed to search a few more.
"Sword. Ring. Earring." I said each word carefully, glancing at their blank faces.
I'm not saying them wrong am I?
Their expressions were disquieting. It wasn't as if I had a lot of experience with their tongue. I was really still half-surprised that I could speak it without the projection of my voice leaping in to fill in and make it some manner of command.
Then again, I should have never lost control of it anyway.
I was almost certain that the reason I could speak their tongue without inflecting it with power was because I didn't do it by instinct. When I spoke their words, I was thinking, and then translating. It was hard to diminish my knowledge of the dragon tongue to fit whatever manner of the mysterious magic of their land required to speak it normally.
"Bag." I said, after a second to flip back through my book.
Given they were just standing there still, I made a shooing motion with my hand, and repeated that. "Bag."
It was the best I could do.
Help me get the spoils.
When Sorzo's gaze went to the bodies we were surrounded by, in the sorry state they were, he grimaced, but gave me a slow nod and muttered something to Denorro. The red mage lifted his arm, tucking it in tight to his front briefly, glancing around. It was a longer delay before he nodded. They both turned, stepping toward flame-licked forms.
Good. Now we're getting somewhere!
I straightened up and after a second to secure my book again at my hip, turned. Crouching down and scooping my arms up underneath the weight of the fallen horse, I grunted, and lifted it, flipping the beast over to release the dead man's legs and found the other half of the saddle bags that it had toppled on. They were still burned, damaged and sticky as I pulled them away with the cooked juice of horsemeat, but flipping open the leather, I noted that they had done better buried under such a thick body than they would have left out atop it.
I rifled through the dead man's things.
He had no coins, and most of it looked like simple survivalist's tools to me. There was a fine string that I was fairly sure was intended for a bow, maybe a backup, but given I didn't have the bow, it didn't matter. It was already damaged as well, I wasn't going to risk stringing anything with it.
He had a knife among the mix, in its sheath. The antler for the hilt had handled the firing well, and its iron blade was unaffected for how protected it had been. It might have lost some of its temper potentially, but I was doubtful. I set it aside as something potentially of value. He had a whetstone, and given it looked better than what I'd seen Sorzo using at camp, I took it from him and began searching around for his weapon that he would have been maintaining with it.
Can't be far.
I gave his body another once over and spotted something I hadn't paid much mind to on first look. There was something going on with his neck, a crack I'd initially written off in the black as having been the charred flesh splitting.
Wait.
I took the knife he'd provided me from its sheath and dug it into his flesh, feeling around, until I felt what I'd suspected.
Metal.
He'd been wearing a necklace.
It took me a second prying it from him, to get the half-fused chain of who knew what metal in its current state, attached to a rounded medallion. I brushed back some of the ash and fused flesh covering, and dragged the edge of the blade along it until I saw the glimmer of silvery-yellow metal.
How many of these things are around here somewhere?
I spared a glance for his remains, a little more mutilated than I'd already made them, and gave him a grateful nod. As I straightened, I decided that the presence of a whetstone suggested a sword, and I hadn't found one yet.
It took me a second to search the general area that the horse might have stood when the blast hit, before it had toppled, but among a few other burned fragments, I found his curved sword. It was as I was lifting it that I spotted part of an arm, a couple of rings remaining on blackened fingers.
I could be here a while.
Once I'd liberated the rings and wiped off my hands for probably the tenth time, with a few more shinies for my troubles, I looked around for my companions. Sorzo was inspecting a body, but movement drew my attention more to Denorro.
He was bent forward, but leaning back with all of his weight, hands wrapped around a dead man's fingers. He was fighting with a stubborn ring with all of his shrimpy old man arms' might.
Abruptly, he stumbled back, spilling onto his ass in a heap, hands going high and scrambling to keep hold of the thing he'd been pulling. For the way he was in his robes, it was everything short of a dress skirt he'd upended.
I realized after a second that it wasn't the ring that had come off.
It was the entire finger.
Denorro's mouth was open in half shock, half horror, holding the blackened digit, with the stubborn ring.
I couldn't help it.
I burst into laughter.
His expression, the position he was in, the finger giving away before the ring, it was just too ripe for it.
Denorro's face jerked about and he looked at me like I'd caught him stealing sweet rolls or something. The abject horror only made me laugh harder, bending over and holding my stomach. It took me a few seconds to get myself under control.
When I looked at him again, he was pushing back to his feet, looking every bit as horrified and embarrassed as he'd been when I first looked. He dragged the dregs of his dignity back to him with rough pats of his hands down his dusty, nasty robes. Once I got myself under control, and we'd taken time enough to loot everything that hadn't been melted away or simply fused into bodies beyond my desire to dig through them, we headed back to the wagons.
Within the wagons was the majority of the supplies and the goods that Malsero had been in the process of moving. He'd presumably taken whatever was the greatest of value to him that could be carried on the horses, but I still had two wagons sitting in front of me. It would take some time to clear a good enough path further in for one or potentially both of them to move down the road in the direction we'd been heading.
We'd be spending most of the afternoon and potentially the night probably clearing the road and reorganizing the wagons.
I moved around to where the horses had been hitched to the lead wagon that was covering most of the road still, and picked up the leathers remaining, winding them around my arms and wrist.
Here we go.
Leaning into the exertion and pulling it, I dragged the front wagon into motion and began to curve it back around toward the correct direction, pulling it off the road carefully and getting it back into something approximating the same position we usually camped in.
Denorro and Sorzo joined me in moving the second to form the same triangular shape we'd used every time we made camp. Obviously, we weren't going anywhere fast.
I pulled out my book again and searched my pages, before looking to Denorro.
"Pot." I said, referencing the page to be sure I got the pronunciation right. "Water."
Denorro nodded to me, and turned to head toward the wagon nearby. I looked to Sorzo, who was watching me unsurely. I motioned to him, and then the wagons, and then motioned to point to my eyes with two fingers and then toward the surrounding area.
After a moment, he nodded and spoke a couple of quick words. I lifted my eyebrows at him, unsure what he meant. He tapped his chest, spoke a word that wasn't his name, and then motioned to his eyes with two fingers, speaking as he pointed them then around the area.
I got out my ink well and quill quickly, sitting down on the ground, and then looked to him, repeated the first word he'd used in reference to himself. I tapped my own chest when I spoke it instead of motioning to him.
I was fairly sure those were the words for "I" and "watch" or "guard".
Then, I lifted two fingers to my eyes and spoke the words he'd used as he motioned. He watched me, nodding slowly unsurely. I referenced my book, and said, "Two."
He blinked at me uncertainly, shifting his weight on his feet.
Then, his eyes widened, and he spoke again, pointing at me. "Ysmir watch two?"
I nodded at him.
Instead he shook his head. He then said, tapping his chest, "I watch…" and a new word, holding up one finger.
I worked my jaw. Then adding the word to my book, lifted a finger and said the word for one back to him. He nodded, and repeated the new word, and then the word for one. It took me a second to think about it, to parse what he meant, but when I did, I quickly nodded.
First.
Sorzo would watch first.
Lifting two fingers, I prompted him with saying, "I watch…?"
"Second." Sorzo said, holding up two fingers. "Ysmir watch second."
I held up three fingers, and said the word for three to him, taking the momentary opportunity of clarity to seek out a number of words, as we worked our way up the count. I noticed as the numbers grew on my page that most words had roots in the number themselves, much like the common tongue of Cyrodiil in a similar fashion, with a root and an attached sound to denote a reference to the number being attached to a relative position. I took the opportunity despite other pressing things, because obscurity details like that were a difficult thing to cross in a language barrier without a beginning point.
"Thank you." I said to him in his own tongue, or at least what I was fairly sure was the appropriate gratitude phrase used among the equal men when I pushed up.
Sorzo patted a hand to his chest, inclined his head gently to me, and turned to move over to the wagon, climbing up to stand on top of the lifted point of the carriage. He was taking up his post.
Denorro came back with the pot and set up, getting it on the hook over a spot I assumed was going to be our campfire location for the night. I followed him and checked the contents of the wagons, and with his help figured out which of the barrels were the ones that had clean drinking water. I wasn't sure how long the trip from wherever they came from was, but it kind of surprised me just how much was packed away. Split only three ways, unless we had a month's journey, I could easily see us being fine for water.
I hefted one of the barrels up under Denorro's watch and carried it out to the pot and placed it down nearby. When I returned to the wagons I started to search through the various containers that Malsero had, looking for something specific. Denorro loitered, watching over me unsurely. It took a little while, but about halfway through, digging through what I was fairly sure was one of the crates with Malsero's more personal effects, I found what I was looking for.
Holding it up to my nose and inhaling faintly, I got a strong punch of something floral and almost winced at its intensity. After a second my nose adjusted, and I lifted the soap to Denorro.
He looked from me to the soap and back. I motioned with my other hand to my lips and forward, and then hefted the soap at him again.
He nodded after a second and repeated a word a few times. I handed him the soap and got out my book, adding it to the list.
Moving back out of the wagons and toward where he had the pot set up, I started gathering rocks. Denorro moved quickly to assist me. He was just grabbing whatever worked, but I was looking for the elongated, flatter bits of stone in the area the most. He already had a ring formed by the time I had a small gathering of them.
I motioned dismissively to him, and after setting aside another rock in the pile dug out my book again, to reference the pages.
"Wood." I told him, motioning dismissively toward the wagon.
Denorro nodded and started off toward the wagons.
I got down and got to business, and dug a bit of a shallow pit next to the pot's placement. Instead of simply lining a ring of protective rocks around a surface for the fire, I wanted to create a mostly flat floor of stone. Given the rocks had various thickness, I only needed it as deep as the most thick one with a bit to spare. It took me some time to make the natural puzzle fit just right, a makeshift cobblestone-like base. I put the largest, most flat pieces of stone near the middle, and after taking dirt and stomping it as flat as I could until the whole thing was sturdy and nothing was moving, turned to find Denorro was sitting nearby watching me curiously.
I gathered up the fouled trinkets I'd found and started to place them on sections of the flat stone that would be beneath the firepit. Glancing to him, I made a curling motion of my hand.
"Ring." I said, again. I pointed to the bag sitting nearby, that I knew was where he and Sorzo had been putting the spoils they'd found. A handful of curved swords in badly burned sheaths sat near it. "Earring."
He looked from me to the things I'd gathered from the Dothraki, and nodded. He reached aside for the bag and passed it to me. I took everything out and started putting out most of the assorted stuff on the stones. It was mostly jewelry that they'd gathered. There was the odd knife in the bag, but I didn't bother with those, tossing them to where the swords sat.
Once I had everything how I wanted it, I got to work stacking up the wood. Adjusting the poles that supported the pot, I brought it over the mix, and then motioned for Denorro, curling fingers to get him closer. He looked at me uncertainly.
I made a motion with my hands, toward the wood.
"Fire." I said in a simple order, and stepped away. I stripped off my top, tossing it aside.
Then I started away up the road to get to work. We needed a path for the wagons to continue the journey.
I spent the better part of the afternoon down the road, making sure the road was mostly clear for our passage. Denorro came up the road after a while to check on me, but I waved him off and back toward the wagons.
I'd chosen to strip off my top because I didn't want to ruin it more with the effects of being smeared in the remains of the people I'd killed. It would already be difficult to clean it. Not that it would ever be great again, but that was its own problem. I didn't take off my boots because I wasn't attached to them, and I was still wearing the rawhide wrap I'd cut from a deer otherwise. The deerhide was replaceable.
I ignored the sun trying to cook my bare back, and the hours crept by slowly. The fires around the road had long gone out, but the fire beneath the pot at our camp sent a wispy white trail of smoke up into the air at odds with the destruction I'd wrought before it. By the time I finished my work to my satisfaction and returned to the camp, Sorzo was sitting instead of standing, occasionally still looking around.
When I lifted a hand to him, he returned the gesture.
Denorro greeted my return with a few words I didn't know, but in the quiet back of my mind, something whispered, "welcome" among them. He looked me over and shook his head in vague disgust I understood. All the same, he motioned me nearer.
I looked to the fire he'd been burning over the remains of our spoils. He hadn't built it up a second time, so it was mostly dead and only smoldering for how long I'd taken getting the road mostly clear.
That was ideal. I'd put everything metal in there for a reason. If they were heated in the coals a great deal, a lot of the impurities… the remains of blood and other foulness that clung to them from pulling them off of superheated dead men, would get cooked away. Then they could be washed thoroughly, and they wouldn't be stinking when we returned to a city.
In my experience, traders would be more inclined to pay a fair price if what they were picking up wasn't caked in the blood and worse of the dead.
Denorro hadn't added anything to the pot yet, which made sense. We hadn't typically eaten before sundown in the past. He must have assumed the fire burning was just for cleaning everything. Which was fine.
I pulled over the barrel of water, tapped as it was, and lifted it up and rested it on my shoulder. Working to get open, I poured some out in the pot. Placing it aside, and searching around to find that soap I'd located, I smeared some around the inside of the pot and in the water, adding plenty.
Setting aside the remaining half of the bar, I walked back to the wagons. Retrieving one of the knives we'd gathered, I dug around in a crate until I found some cloth that wasn't whatever that silk-like material was. Drawing out the knife, I cut a bit from the larger length.
Returning to the campfire near Denorro, I placed it aside and pulled my wooden box that would be my seat closer to the pot of water mixed with soap. Easing down with a tired groan and ignoring the tingling of my shoulders from prolonged sun exposure, I worked the fastenings of my boots, pulling them off. Wiggling my toes in the dirt briefly, and then straightening enough to do the same with my deer hide wrap that provided me with my base decency, I glanced at Denorro as I stripped.
The mage-priest turned his cheek to my slightly, but he offered nothing otherwise.
I tossed the boots and wrap aside and then took the knife out that I'd used to cut the cloth. It wasn't important to me, and I hadn't seen any of them using a tool to do what I wanted to do, so I was going to once again make do. Using one of the larger rocks near the fire, I started to bring the knife down harshly atop its flat surface, blunting the tip one harsh stab into stone at a time.
My motions clearly drew Denorro's attention back to me, and he watched me work curiously. Once I had the tip practically sheared off and dulled by repeated drags, I started to do the same to the blade, ruining its ability to really cut.
I didn't have to be gentle with it, in fact I had to be the opposite. The knife wasn't anything special to begin with, so it didn't take me long really trying to dull it to the point where it wouldn't be cutting anyone likely ever again. At least not without someone taking the right tools to it for a while.
Then, I dropped it in the boiling soapy water.
As I let it sit in there for a while, I looked to Denorro, considering the state of his red robes. It had the appearance of having been repaired a number of times. His tumble among the mess hadn't been good for it.
I resolved to see it cleaned with my top, or to find him something that worked among the things in the wagons.
Eventually, I retrieved the knife I'd converted into a cleaning implement, and cupping its surface, started to use its edge to rub away the more clinging gunk from my efforts to clear the road. I let myself almost relax as I worked to scrape, flick, and then scrape again, to get the majority of my dirt and grime out of the way. Occasionally, I had to drag the knife along the edge of the rock I'd used to dull it to get the clinging nastiness off, before repeating.
Once I was mostly satisfied with having gotten the worst of it, I placed aside the converted tool and went to the rag.
It wasn't an ideal bath, but I hadn't had one in many days by then, and with scented soap on hand, I made the most of it. Denorro eventually went away toward the wagons, going to dig through things. I didn't know what he was looking for.
Once I'd finished scrubbing myself clean with the cloth, at least as clean as I felt like I could ever be without something to really dunk myself in and soak, I set aside the washcloth.
"Sorzo!" I said, drawing his attention back to me.
The swordsman sitting atop the wagons looked at me at my call and stood up.
I lifted the blunted knife, and motioned to the soapy water and then him. He looked from me to the water, and seemed to hesitate, before hopping down and making his way over. I wagged the knife again, and then motioned to the cloth. Going through the motion of faking scrubbing myself again, I indicated him.
He said a word that sounded almost like a question.
Whatever the source of the occasional words I had, it offered nothing for it, so I just shrugged at him, and motioned invitingly.
Sorzo looked toward the wagon. Following his eyes to the spot, I straightened up.
"I watch." I told him, patting my bare chest.
After I get something to wrap around my waist.
I left him there, and headed for the wagons. I found Denorro digging through another crate, searching its contents. He had some things pulled out, all of it clothing by the looks of it. At my approach he glanced at me, and then shook his head, snorting faintly.
As if he could read my mind, he dug through the things he had out and threw something at me. It was made of one of the softer materials I noted, as I caught it. Shaking it out, it took me a second given its shape to realize what it was. A kind of dark red pants, thin at the waist, and thicker along the legs all the way to the ankle where they narrowed again. There were some lengths of narrower, more satin cloth attached to the ankles.
Shrugging, I started to put them on, only for Denorro's quick intrusion, a lifted hand and a couple of sounds of protest to draw me up short.
He tossed another bit of cloth to me, this one more like an off-white scarf. I blinked at him unsurely.
He made a motion with his hand toward my crotch.
Ahhh.
I quickly looped it around my waist and while it took me a second to get the vague idea down, managed to get myself a kind of undergarment made and tied off. It took me a few more tries than I would have liked, but it was comfortable enough.
Feeling a bit silly over their choice of clothing and amused with myself all the more besides it for the sense of adventure it gave me, I lifted my hands to Denorro in a wordless suggestion of pride. His slow sigh couldn't have been more telling of his age.
I pulled myself into the pants and cinched the waist, but then looked confusedly at the attached lengths of cloth at the ankles. I assumed they were meant to be tied off. Sitting down on a crate, I lifted my heel up to the edge beside me and shook them at Denorro in a wordless question.
He stepped over, and curled them around, making a few deliberate wraps around my ankle, and looking me in the eye.
Oh.
That made sense. He finished up the one for me, showing me how to tie it and I presumed what the appropriate look was intended for the material, and I nodded, waving off his hands before they went to the other.
To help keep out sand?
Or keep tight to the ankle for boots and socks.
Once I had that in place, I hopped down, and Denorro tossed me a new garment I recognized as being a shirt because it was effectively the same general design as the previous one I'd worn. I pulled it on, and noted it fit slightly different, a little more flat at the shoulders, and loose at my arms.
Now I regret not just wearing the other one during the work.
If I had been under the impression I could just throw it away, I'd have sacrificed the shirt.
Looking over the other things he'd retrieved briefly, I turned and made my way back toward the drop down. Exiting the back of the wagon and crossing over, I climbed up on top of the back wagon to sit and take my watch as I'd promised.
Sorzo was sitting near the fire, cleaning himself still obviously.
I paid him no mind, content to watch the sun set.
Eventually Denorro came back out of the wagon, and after a time to get himself cleaned up as well, took to having quiet conversation with the swordsman. He changed into one of the garments he'd retrieved as well, instead of his old robes.
I came down after that and seeing as everyone was done using the water for their bodies, gathered up the ash-covered jewelry and odds and ends of some value and dropped them in the pot.
With the water near to boil and soapy, I stirred it all around and let it cook in the mix until I was satisfied. I took the rag I'd used before and gathering out different pieces for inspection, eventually had it all mostly clean and rinsed, with a little extra scrubbing. I was mostly careful with it all and being meticulous, because I knew I'd need the wealth sooner or later here. The difference between Malsero and his men was telling.
It was not long after last light, the pot having been washed out thoroughly in the meantime, when I noticed riders coming back up the road. I recognized them immediately from afar, and the slower trot necessary for their return. Two approached upright on their horses, both of them Dothraki men. Three horses were hitched to trail those two, with only two riders on them, but laid over them and bound like cargo instead of in saddle.
I recognized Malsero and one of the first man he'd assigned to saddle. The blood dripping down the side of the latter's horse's hind leg made me doubt he was still alive. When the horses shifted a little more sideways, I noticed he had an arrow still sticking out of his shoulder. It looked deep.
Dead.
If not already, then very soon.
The sound of the hooves reached my companions then, and Denorro and Sorzo both stood up, the latter drawing his sword.
As the Dothraki's horses cantered on up, I saw the moment their confusion and horror hit.
One of them shouted something, and lifted a curved sword high. The other drew an arrow on his bowstring, leveling it on Denorro.
I reached out and snapped up one of the knives in the pile with the gathered swords, flinging it hard.
It spun end over end faster than the man could react. It hit him flat, but that didn't matter. With how hard I threw it, already pushing to my feet, I watched his head go back and his arrow's aim drift off to the side.
He loosed the arrow less than a second later, but it was already off course. It buried itself in the dirt nearby, as I was already clearing the gap between where I'd been sitting and his horse.
I hit his horse at a full sprint.
His horse was thrown onto its side. The horse with the arrow-lodged dead man tied to it reared but its reins kept it as it stomped back down, stepping nearby. It was tied to the one I'd knocked over and panicking some for the sight. It wasn't a war horse clearly. They trained a lot of that out of war horses.
The one wielding a bow let out a furious sound, having managed to get his leg out from beneath the horse before it toppled on him and drew his sword.
I heard the thudding of hooves behind me as his fellow closed. Sorzo was running toward me, curved sword lifted, probably to try to defend me.
He wouldn't reach me before either of them got their swords in my vicinity.
At least these loose clothes are light.
I was used to heavy armor. In the silk-like materials of the baggy pants, I felt practically naked by comparison.
It made it laughably easy to side step and lean out of the passage of the mounted Dothraki's curved sword as he charged by. The dismounted one managed to get his feet underneath him. I reached down, instinctively going for a sword I didn't have. My old one was over at the fire near Denorro where I'd removed most of my things to get clean.
I stepped back, retreating again and again, leaning left and right as the Dothraki swung the curved blade rapidly.
"Sword!" I said to Sorzo, throwing out an open hand in demand.
He threw his own at me without hesitation.
An almost alarming lack of it.
As it spun in the air slowly toward me, I found myself wondering where I'd instilled that particular bit of confidence in him. The Dothraki hesitated in the bare moment of a whirling sword coming toward his advance, reflexively twitching back from the assault. I turned, and watching the rotations, timed the spin to let it pass just by me before seizing the grip.
The dismounted Dothraki swept his sword around in an arc as I drew Sorzo's blade to parry. I caught it high coming for my head. Deflecting it, I immediately pushed forward as I drew its curved edge around toward my attacker's head in return.
It was my first opportunity to see the swordsmanship of the men that seemed to inspire fear locally.
He deflected in a mirrored example of how I had, and drove his blade forward and down sharply for my hand. I stepped back and moved my hand aside, turning the curved edge of the blade Sorzo lent me in a sharp motion that cut the Dothraki's own hand.
I got lost briefly in my examination of their style of using a sword, as I dragged out a few more exchanged parries and ripostes. My building disappointment evaporated when I heard the ring of new swords in contact as hooves beat the ground.
The other Dothraki charged by, as Sorzo rolled away from the reach of the horseman's blade.
I put aside my martial curiosity.
Feinting a high sweep, I let him perceive an easy opportunity to deflect on the inside and extend the point of his blade up toward my exposed face. He took the bait without active thought.
It would be a death blow if it connected well, even though the swords we were using had some curve to them. I stepped right and drove the high feint he'd been deflecting down hard into the Dothraki's blade. As far as leverage went, two normal men on relatively equal footing would have found our positions more in his favor.
I wasn't normal though.
I struck his sword hard enough his guard fell down entirely.
In the next moment, I continued my step in and turned the edge up. The blade passed through his neck and severed his spine. His head was already falling free, when I got eyes on the horseman making a charge again for Sorzo.
I ran to meet him and as he lifted his blade high on a pass by, dropped into a slide. It let me dodge the swipe of his sword. My own stayed out to the side and I connected with his horse's lead left leg.
It was galloping, and suddenly one of its legs just wasn't connected below the knee.
It tumbled immediately and the Dothraki went flying.
His landing wasn't soft, but as he moved to get upright, I stepped over to Sorzo, looking him over. He'd managed to avoid getting run down and killed in my moment of curiosity, which I was glad for. He had one new cut, a slice down the length of his left arm from a near miss.
The Dothraki pushed up, battered and bruised. He looked aside at his horse, grabbing his sword up from the dirt where he'd dropped it. I watched him consider the horse's missing limb with a brief grimace and fixed his mustachioed expression of frustration upon us. Wordlessly, he pulled quiver and bow from his back, which had somehow survived the tumble mostly, and threw them on the ground aside.
He lifted the sword high and readied himself for final death.
I admired it.
Familiar.
I waved off Sorzo and stepped forward, making up my mind. He stepped forward and to the right. I followed his invitation momentarily.
We circled only a moment before our blades met.
He came in with a slash from high to low. I was fairly sure given the shapes of their swords, that thrusts were going to have less prominence in the Dothraki sword style. The one I had fought already seemed fairly experienced.
I let him set the pace, focused only on swordplay and defense. It made things harder, to be fair. In most fights, the goal above all else was to kill whoever was trying to kill you as fast as possible. As steel rang with another of his flourishing attacks, deflected with minimal effort, I watched him closely and waited for my opportunity.
I threw out a few light, testing swipes at his thighs when he stepped forward too aggressively, and punished when his eagerness to push me got the better of him by slapping aside his blade with my own and putting him off balance.
It wasn't a minute or so, an already long fight by most standards, that I tired of his attempts. I'd given him a good fight, but I'd already decided I would leave one alive.
Someone has to spread the tale.
I caught his blade on mine's edge and swept his feet, seizing his sword arm in the process. He landed hard with only my grip on his wrist keeping him partially upright. I placed the edge of my sword under his chin deliberately.
But will he let me?
The Dothraki's harsh breathing was loud to my senses as I looked down at him. I shifted my grip, and pried his sword from his hand, without taking my eyes off of his. I let his arm drop in the process.
I stepped back and surveyed the scene more broadly.
One horse was down, permanently, but not yet dead. The one I'd thrown over had righted itself by now in the chaos. The horses that had been on trail had been let to roam, and in the chaos, it seemed Denorro had retrieved them before they could get spooked enough to run off.
The sound of a blade on leather drew my attention back to the Dothraki who'd gotten to his feet. He lifted a knife.
Before I could think much on what he intended with it, he drew around the long length of his braid, and sheared it free in one motion.
I tilted my head, considering him.
He cast the braid on the ground in between us.
Interesting.
I didn't know the meaning of the gesture. Before I could really begin to figure it out, he abruptly bolted toward his companion's horse and hopped on it as if he lived there.
The horse and the Dothraki started to gallop away into the plains. I watched them go with a little chuckle. Moving over and leaning down, I plucked up the smooth black strands of his braid.
Not as messy as cutting out a tongue, for sure.
I assumed it was either a sign of defeat, a loss of honor, or shame, or something else. It was clearly something done with meaning, and related to either me sparing his life or just defeating him. If it was a matter that he should certainly die, maybe I'd insulted him or something.
I flicked the braid over my shoulder and turned to where Denorro was helping Malsero down from the saddle. Sorzo reached out to me, and said something, pointing to the blade in my hand.
His blade.
I returned it to him with an understanding nod.
"Thank you." I told him, motioning to the sword once again.
He nodded, but I didn't have his attention longer than that second further. He barked something, and pointed that sword at the merchant that had just been let down onto his own feet. As he stepped forward threateningly, lifting the sword up, Malsero stepped back, lifting his hands.
He spoke rapidly as Sorzo closed, but my understanding of their language didn't catch much more than a quiet whispered agreement at the back of my mind. Malsero's waving, bare hands were urging Sorzo not to do something which seemed fairly obvious given the swordsman had his blade back and the merchant had left him for dead.
Denorro had already moved out of the way, and clearly wanted no part in being directly between Sorzo and the merchant, given he was unarmed.
Sorzo lunged, bringing the blade down.
I'd already been moving, anticipating it, and managed to get the Dothraki who I'd defeated's blade out in time to catch it before it could get to Malsero.
Sorzo looked at me, aghast, angry, and obviously confused.
Malsero had been trying to step back to dodge the swing of the warrior, and upset his balance. He tumbled onto his ass.
The merchant said something a few times, pointing to me and then Denorro and Sorzo, scrambling back and getting his feet under him. Some relief and confidence returned to him.
That and Sorzo's anger lasted until I presented the blade I held to him, hilt first.
Malsero blinked at me in confusion.
I didn't care about Malsero's betrayal. I never felt any loyalty to him, and hadn't really expected anything less than him to likely run at conflict if it was overwhelming enough. So I didn't really feel the way Sorzo probably would. Especially since he'd seemed to be used as a distraction.
Even still…
You should die with a blade in your hand.
I reached out and seized Malsero's hand and drew it up to force it to take hold of the blade. He looked at me and then Sorzo, panicked. He saw it for what it was. If he'd ever had any training at all, I couldn't imagine he'd kept it up given his shape and behavior.
I stepped out of the way, and Sorzo lunged forward.
My suspicions were confirmed almost immediately. Malsero had no training, and Sorzo cut him within the first few seconds. It wasn't a death blow, but it was enough to have the merchant doing his best to keep the swordsman's edge from making contact.
I could tell that Sorzo wasn't even trying.
I expected him to finish the merchant off in short order, to get his vengeance he felt he was owed. It seemed like my brief intervention had been enough to calm his temper some though. Instead, after a few more cuts and a smack with the flat of the blade, he had the merchant on his ass and his own blade pointed down at him.
He said something, and Malsero replied rapidly, nodding and pointing to one of the horses. I didn't have the context or understanding for the words being spoken, but Sorzo continued, and then looked at Denorro.
The mage-priest in red nodded his head at that.
Malsero got his feet under him, and with a few longer gashes down his arms ran over to his horse, keeping the sword I'd handed him close in the meanwhile. He dug around in the saddlebags and produced that smaller chest I'd seen him store things in before.
In short order, he fumbled through it, finally dropping the sword, and shakily doing something to a piece of paper he retrieved, stamping it and holding it aloft toward Denorro. He said something to Sorzo, and shook it roughly.
Denorro moved over and took the piece of paper from the merchant and after a second to study it, nodded to Sorzo who just exhaled and spit aside. The priest promptly handed the piece of paper to the swordsman who turned his back on the merchant and moved over to ease back down by the firepit.
I moved to retrieve one of the knives and then went over to finish off the downed horse, which was still making harsh noises and upsetting the others.
Denorro tied off the remaining horses in the meantime, and pulled the dead man down from one of them. It wasn't ideal work for his old bones, but Sorzo clearly wasn't in the mood to be helpful any further.
I helped him get the horses in order, and once he had we began to settle in. It was going to be a long night. There were conversations going on between them, but they were using words I definitely didn't have in my book.
By the time I returned to the campfire, Malsero was settled in to sit, with Denorro placed between him and Sorzo. There was some kind of argument going on already again. My sitting down brought it to an odd halt.
Sorzo said the word for horses, the wagons, and then indicated me.
Malsero looked aggrieved and said something sharply, lifting his chin toward me. He glanced toward the wagons.
Arguing over the goods?
Realistically I could argue that Malsero had abandoned the goods, and I had claimed them. That he thought we were going to die or that they were going to be taken by the Dothraki didn't really matter. The real problem was that I couldn't exactly argue my point.
While I had the basis of communication, I hadn't gotten a lot of obscure concepts.
Drawing the idea of abandoning someone or something and then someone claiming something would be difficult, and I didn't really know the local laws regarding possessions. In Skyrim, a lot of the time, it just came down to who possessed them after a conflict. In more rare cases, whether someone with enough force and willingness to fight over them came around or obscure laws.
That could present itself in a local authority lending itself on the behalf of someone else.
I wasn't sure my odds as a foreigner without the ability to speak their language of having the support of whatever local group amounted to authority, but I still felt fairly sure that the goods could theoretically be argued as mine since he'd abandoned them on the side of the road.
I referenced my book of words.
"Wagon." I said, speaking up finally. "Horse. Sword."
My words had brought silence among those talking. They were watching me. Malsero's lips were pursed.
I motioned broadly to the wagons, and then patted my chest gently with a palm.
Mine.
"Malsero." I said, cutting off the merchant opening his mouth again on the edge of words. I lifted my right hand, forming two legs with fingertips and making a motion as if to run with them. I flicked aside my hand dismissively, rolling my eyes at him for emphasis.
I noticed Denorro's expression didn't exactly suggest his agreement with my interpretation of events. He was just abstaining from involvement in the suggestion for the most part.
Sorzo snorted softly and nodded sharply in agreement with me, then he said something to Denorro, and tapped his own cheek beneath his eye. It was where the tattoo of a sword sat. The one I'd felt was some kind of cultural thing.
The priest looked around and found the blunted knife I'd turned into a crude metal scraper for us to use to bathe and after a second to adjust, placed its blade in the edge of the coals of our firepit.
Malsero took the opportunity to reach for the sword that I'd handed him before. It didn't have its sheath -- the Dothraki had ridden off with the sheath still strapped to him. I noticed the merchant hadn't let it be too far from him since his exchange with Sorzo, and the dirty looks the merchant had given the swordsman were fairly mutual.
That all made sense.
I just wasn't sure why he was giving Denorro the same treatment really. It felt like an odd situation, and obviously before my arrival and the attack by the Dothraki, things had been in a very different order in camp, but I may have underestimated the difference of their places in society if his reaction was anything to go on for the turnabout.
Then again, thinking about it, I couldn't recall a single time during the trip that I'd seen that someone had told him, "No."
Maybe I really didn't get it.
Malsero drew a couple of boxes in the dirt with the tip of the sword, and then motioned to the wagons. He indicated the horses, and drew a few vague ovals with lines that I assumed were meant to be legs.
He was speaking slowly, but despite that, I only got the vague whisper of pay in the back of my mind for one of his words.
He cut a line down between one of the boxes, and then marked an arrow toward himself, and then the other, toward me.
I looked from the ground to his face and back, lifting an eyebrow.
Negotiating?
I glanced at Denorro.
The red priest looked from the knife in the edge of the fire over at me. I hooked my thumb to Malsero and lifted my chin in confusion.
He hesitated but looked toward the drawing in the dirt and then said something to Malsero. The merchant scowled a little at him, and then replied with a few words that were brisk. Among them, I heard a word that had been referenced a few times already since my joining the caravan group originally.
Volantis.
Denorro looked down at the marks in the ground and then motioned to me and then Malsero.
"... … agreement … … …" The priest said a number of things, but I didn't understand anything but that one word that had been referenced before.
Sorzo grunted softly, and I glanced at him.
His expression was consternated, but looking annoyedly between Denorro and Malsero he nodded at me.
I don't understand at all though.
Malsero presented an open hand, a palm out to me, and then motioned again to the boxes he'd drawn, representing the wagons.
A deal.
I started to put together a vague idea. Payment. An agreement. One of the wagons instead of both. Despite myself, I found the thought forming in the back of my head that I could just kill him and then I'd possess both of the wagons even by the standards of whatever local authority probably existed. At least assuming there weren't any oddities regarding inheritance or outsiders or who knew what else.
An agreement between us would be more valid though.
I decided I didn't really care to specifically have either of the wagons in the first place, and if I was being acknowledged by the original owner to possess half of the remaining goods, then that was far better than risking trouble with local governing authorities before I knew what was going on.
I shrugged at him, and then nodded, leaning to reach out and take his hand.
I shook it, and he seemed relieved.
Sorzo was sour, and Denorro turned his attention back to the fire.
A short while later, he bundled up some cloth and gripped the knife and pulled it from the fire. It wasn't glowing red or anything, but I would have assumed it to be very hot regardless at the blade that had been sitting on the edge of the coals.
I watched him curiously as he turned to Sorzo and held up the blunted knife.
Sorzo lifted his chin and closed one of his eyes as Denorro leaned in. I tilted a little to get a better vantage to see what they were doing.
Denorro got the knife close to his face, and after a little adjustment pressed its blunted end carefully to the skin of Sorzo's under-eye tattoo. The swordsman flinched back with a sound of pain, but Denorro just puffed out a breath at him and drew his head back nearer.
Sorzo's tattoo wasn't large like Denorro's flames. A few seconds of wincing and twitching with pain after the red priest pressed and burned it again and again, and he released the swordsman who was breathing heavily.
I shook my head slowly.
In Skyrim, magic would have made short work of that.
Still, the burn wouldn't be bad, all things considered. It was only the size of the smaller coins I'd been using to trade with Malsero before. Realistically the merchant's own cuts and gashes he'd gotten from Sorzo knocking him around to get his frustration out were far more risky by comparison.
Why now?
It was possible the tattoo represented him being part of a specific order or something. I'd only thought that Denorro had that feeling about him, especially with his own tattoos, but now I wondered at all of the men that I'd seen that had similar small sword tattoos under their eyes before.
I'll figure it out eventually.
Whatever the reason, clearly Sorzo had put that behind him. The piece of paper he'd gotten from Malsero was safely stowed away in his belongings, and I wasn't sure if it was more of a deed or contract, but whatever it was, he clearly thought it valuable and didn't want to risk it being damaged.
Either way I had a good start now. From just doeskin and a bit of bandit goods to one of the wagons. A horse to pull it too.
We'll be moving a little slower without two on each wagon.
The three men had quiet conversation around the fire late into the night. More than once I noticed Malsero looking at me skeptically, and I surmised he'd been told I was the one to kill the Dothraki.
He didn't seem to know what to think of the suggestion, so I didn't pay him any mind. If the state of all of the bodies wasn't enough, I wasn't going to be sitting around giving people demonstrations for their entertainment.
When I decided to retire for the night, I picked the front wagon as my wagon, placing my things in it pointedly and pointing Malsero toward the other one. It was my final act of the night, and while he seemed annoyed with the gesture, he nodded and went to the other that I'd been sleeping in before.
It wasn't that one was more or less comfortable than the other, though that was ever so slightly true given the one I'd taken had an ugly carpet laid out within. It was mostly that I suspected one of them had more valuables than the other, even if only slightly. Maybe with him having obviously claimed the most valuable things for his own horse when he rode off before, it meant he still made out the better for it.
Later in the night, the wagon's wood creaked and I woke up enough to see Sorzo at its edge. He motioned to himself, and then pointed in the wagon across from me.
I nodded absently at him and rolled over, bundling back up the goods I'd been using as a makeshift pillow to get comfortable again.
No one was on watch.
It was probably dangerous, and maybe in the coming days we'd have to figure something out, but just then, I was tired, everyone was tired, and I doubted realistically anyone put on a long watch would last other than me.
I decided that if someone or something else attacked in the night, I'd just kill them when they woke me up.
"Speaking?" Rhaena asked her daughter with a furrowed brow. "What makes you think he was speaking?"
In the quiet of her study, she pulled out a chair and indicated her daughter to sit, before pulling out her own next to it to lower down into.
What's gotten into her?
She'd barged in, practically beside herself.
"I know what I heard." Aerea said insistently, squeezing the arms of the chair she'd been pressed down into. "Balerion is trying to speak, mother. He called me girl!"
Rhaena rubbed her eyes and shook her head. "Dragons are capable of a broad range of vocalizations. Some of them can sound odd, almost even familiar, but it's just sounds. I don't mean to disappoint you…"
"You're not listening." Aerea insisted, sitting forward and reaching out to grab her arm.
Rhaena exhaled through her nose, and hesitated simply because that was the first time her daughter had willingly been the one to breach physical contact with her in a long time.
"I'm listening." She assured her after a second, more soothingly. "What makes you so sure he was speaking?"
"He was repeating the sound." Aerea explained, squeezing her forearm insistently. "He tried it a few different times. He was trying to sound it out. I'm telling you. He was speaking. Or trying."
Rhaena sat forward a bit, aware she'd have to choose her words carefully. She didn't want Aerea to perceive some distance, or that she wasn't hearing her.
"Balerion is the oldest dragon alive." She voiced to her daughter. "Arguably, one of the most well known ones for it. He was around a great many people, and Aegon was well documented. I don't want to tell you that you didn't hear what you believe you heard. I'm just saying this because there has never been anything mentioned about Balerion trying to speak. Or any dragon."
Aerea opened her mouth, to interrupt, but Rhaena held up her free hand to make her point.
"This isn't to say that dragons couldn't learn to understand different tongues, but we use High Valyrian to command them, because they take better to it naturally and it harkens to our ancestry." She explained. "They have always been spoken to in High Valyrian, going back to the empire. Balerion understands more High Valyrian commands than perhaps most dragons alive. If you're so sure he's trying to speak, could you show me?"
Aerea surged up, pulling her arm immediately and nodding.
She noted in the back of her mind that when she'd told her to go rest, Aerea had taken the opportunity to go rest with her dragon apparently, but that was a discussion for another time. While she was freshened up, her daughter still stank of them.
"I don't know, but if I try, maybe I can make him do it again." Aerea insisted, already trying to pull her toward the door.
Rhaena let her, and they fell in step, making their way through the keep. When Aerea started her way to the stairs that led up higher instead of lower, she resisted the urge to sigh.
Right.
Atop the drum.
Even more stairs waited for her. She'd been looking forward to laying about for a bit and relaxing.
They made their way up to the stairway opening to the top of the central column of Dragonstone, past an entryway into a room she tried not to think about. The one where the map of Westeros lay.
Where Androw had spent most of his days.
As they stepped out into the cooler air of the late afternoon high up, the wind buffeted both of their hair to and fro. They emerged under the edge of one of Balerion's wings, and her daughter immediately walked confidently further into his space. She came to a stop at the edge of the steps, in case her sudden nearness might be received poorly by the great dragon.
Rhaena noted his gargantuan eyes. Balerion was focused on the horizon, staring off into the distance southeast across the island.
She had no arguments that their dragons were intelligent. Any rider that spent enough time with them came to learn that they were. They had personalities, too. They were influenced heavily by their upbringing and history.
Balerion was a warrior. There could be no mistaking his purpose in life had been above everything to destroy for the sake of conquering. She had little doubt it influenced his naturally prickly behavior. Despite that, he wasn't showing any of the typical signs to suggest unrest with her near presence. He glanced at Aerea and her, huge head swiveling down and low slowly to break his statuesque stillness and direct his attention to his rider.
Slow. That's good.
He was aware Aerea was smaller than him by far and weaker for it too. That was true for people in general, but Balerion's experience was showing again. Fast movements could be debilitating if he accidentally made contact with his rider unprepared.
"Say it again!" Aerea demanded of the huge dragon, shouting up to his face.
Rhaena fought the immediate impulse to try to seize her daughter and drag her away from Balerion. It was a protective urge that was mostly unnecessary, but the tone, the way she'd spoken… it wasn't impossible for a dragon, even one who'd chosen a rider, to take offense at something done.
She could only hope based on whatever feelings she was getting from Balerion, that Aerea had it all in hand.
Balerion's amber eyes focused down on Aerea. A low sound thrummed up in his throat, an almost clucking sound that dragons sometimes made that was generally reserved for suggesting approval of something. He was pleased to see her daughter. It was much the same reaction as a hound wagging its tail happily.
But no words came.
She looked to Aerea, who glanced at her.
Her daughter scowled and called up to Balerion again.
"Say it again!" She commanded over the low wind.
The black dragon looked down at them with seemingly no understanding and then after a long moment, began to turn its nose back toward the distant horizon. The sun was getting low.
Aerea looked on the verge of tears, frustrated.
Rhaena hadn't been looking forward to disappointing her, but all the same she wasn't very surprised.
Still, it wasn't fair not to give her every opportunity to prove her perspective.
"Speak." She called to Aerea, in High Valyrian.
It wasn't a command they taught their dragons for obvious reasons. But that was the correct word, for what she was demanding from him in Westerosi.
The great dragon's head turned back to face them, but now its eyes were on her. Slitted pupils were focused, and she watched his chest as he took in a breath. She doubted he was going to breathe fire, as she was more in line with Aerea than anything and he hadn't seemed ready to roast her any time soon, but still something about the behavior stood out to her.
He'd listened.
He'd heard her.
"Speak!" Aerea screamed up at her dragon desperately, in High Valyrian. "I heard you. I know you can!"
Balerion looked down at Aerea and started to rise onto his feet, wings unfurling and shifting on all sides as he began to move.
Rhaena ducked down slightly into the edge of the stairway, and called out to Aerea in a quick warning, "Get down!"
Aerea wouldn't listen, heedless in her confidence that Balerion wouldn't hurt her, that he might not hurt her intentionally. That, or simply too stubborn after being made to look a fool for whatever sounds her dragon had made that made her run to find her.
"Speak!" Aerea commanded again as Balerion's weight pushed around the tower.
It finally happened. A wing's edge trying to adjust without displacing Aerea struck her. It was barely a glancing blow, but Aerea tumbled in a heap.
Rhaena threw herself up over the edge of the stairway, running.
Her panic lanced into the heart of Dreamfyre whose distant, trumpeting cry from the yard rose up.
Balerion rose onto his hind legs and his wings lifted high, unfurling in full. Rhaena seized the back of Aerea's riding dress and her arm and wrenched her up, dragging her along the stone toward the stairway.
She watched Balerion's chest expand that little bit more, throat tightening.
Even with how fast she acted, she didn't make it back to the stairway.
Balerion's head dropped forward and his gaping maw of teeth opened. A guttural rumbling rose into a thrum that became warning, and then vibration she could feel in her chest.
Fire surged past them, pouring in a stream of bright color that sent her hair whipping and the heat growing sharply.
Rhaena staggered out of the way best she could, but realized as she lay breathless and holding Aerea in the next moment that he hadn't been trying to breathe fire on them. If he had, they already would have been dead.
Light and heat passed them by, but without the intensity she'd have known for the flames that Balerion could breathe, and moreover brighter than all writing had long indicated for the dragon's flame. Balerion's fire was black dominantly, with a red underbelly.
What blew past them was a stream of bright yellow fire.
For a moment she could only feel her own breathing and hear the sound of Aerea's as she lay on the black stone of the drum's roof with Balerion bearing down on them, stood in triumphant defensiveness.
A sharp cry from the yard saw Dreamfyre's form rising into the sky and trumpeting her own fury. It wasn't abnormal for a dragon to deal with any emotion that wasn't a good one with immediately following aggression.
She tried to focus on her own realization, her own calm and send that through to the she-dragon.
Before she could, Balerion bellowed deep and loud and then settled his wings down on the stone's top with a riotous scrabble of heavy claws.
His amber eyes focused on them and then a deep sound emerged from him, partly growling through something new.
"Yoooool."
Her jaw dropped.
It was no word she'd ever heard, but it was by all means very much a sound intonated intentionally.
Post Notes:
There you have it. Another chapter.
Not to pull back the curtain too much, but I've had some off and on again health stuff affect me which people who've read my stories might have heard mention of. I'm also in a fairly rough economical situation, and writing has only ever been a thing I did for fun and to hopefully bring a good story to someone. In light of the fact however that I may within some time be without a roof over my head without bringing in additional means, I'm considering a lot of alternative ways to add to the income. Maybe commissions, or switching to write more casual but consistent and putting things on a patreon or something. That or rewriting and actually finishing Immortality (something I've put off for a while) and hoping it going up somewhere for sale will get me a little bit of helper money.
If you've any interest in these things potentially, feel free to search my profile for the discord link or send me a message directly. Love to hear your thoughts about that stuff.