Chapter 75: Subjugation of Tyrosh
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Two Moons Later
Archon of Tyrosh POV
For three weeks, unease had crept through the free city of Tyrosh. By the end of the third, it had ripened into chaos.
At first, there had been only scattered whispers in the markets, which warned of the incoming chaos. Warehouses that bustled with activity one night stood deserted by dawn. Merchant vessels slipped from their berths without declaring a destination. Even sellsword captains began refusing rich contracts without explanation.
Such things were not unusual in Tyrosh. Coins changed hands, and loyalties changed with it. Men disappeared after borrowing from the wrong magister or offending a powerful merchant.
That was what I thought till my allies began to vanish as well.
The first was Magister Varro, whose ships carried nearly half the dyes leaving the city. His servants claimed he had departed for Myr on urgent business, yet none of his vessels had sailed. Two nights later, the captain of the Black Horns failed to attend our customary supper. By morning, his lieutenants had emptied their barracks and vanished with nearly three hundred sellswords.
Others followed.
A banker who had financed my election as Archon. A merchant whose warehouses supplied grain to the palace. Two sellsword captains whose loyalty I had purchased with land, gold, and brides from lesser Tyroshi families.
All of them were gone.
Some disappeared with their entire households, while others left warm beds behind them and cups half-full upon their tables.
I sent spies and sellswords into the markets, the pleasure houses, the foreign quarter, and the counting rooms of every merchant prince who had ever spoken against me.
None of them returned.
By the third week, the silence from my allies became a risk to me. After all, too many people had vanished for chance to explain it. Someone was stripping away my power, ally by ally, without leaving behind a name, a witness, or so much as a trail of blood. They would soon aim for me.
There was one pattern that had emerged.
As my allies disappeared, the followers of R'hllor seemed to grow bolder and bolder.
Tyrosh had never belonged to a single god. Temples and shrines lined its streets and waterfronts, honoring Three-Headed Trios, the Patternmaker, the Lord of Light, and a dozen lesser gods brought by sailors from distant shores. The red temple had stood within the city for longer than I had held office, and its priests had once drawn no more notice than any others.
That has changed now.
Red priests who had once preached to small gatherings of dockhands and beggars now commanded entire market squares. They spoke before the Fountain of the Drunken God, along the waterfront, and beneath the walls of the inner city. From dawn until nightfall, their voices carried over the streets.
They proclaimed that Azor Ahai had come again, born amidst smoke and salt. They claimed the champion of the Lord of Light already walked among us.
At sunset, nightfires blazed in every quarter of Tyrosh. The priests called out, and tens of thousands answered as one.
"The night is dark and full of terrors." The words rolled across the city like distant thunder.
Under ordinary circumstances, I would have ordered the sermons silenced and the loudest priests seized.
These were not ordinary circumstances.
An Archon was not a king. I had been chosen from the conclave of the wealthiest and noblest men in Tyrosh, and many who had raised me to my seat would gladly cast me down if it increased their own fortunes.
If I sent the watch against the red priests, my rivals would call it tyranny. If a single priest died, the faithful might turn upon my men in numbers the watch could never contain.
The city was already balanced upon the edge of chaos. I did not know who was dismantling my power or how many enemies surrounded me. I could not afford to turn the whole red faith against me.
And so, I endured the sermons.
Meanwhile, the gatherings provided perfect cover for whoever was behind the disappearances. Spies, assassins, and fleeing traitors could lose themselves among the worshippers before my guards drew near. A man might enter a crowd in one quarter of the city and emerge in another wearing a different cloak, or never emerge at all.
That was what frightened me most. My enemies no longer needed secret tunnels or hidden chambers. Tyrosh itself was now hiding them.
I was brooding as I stood upon the balcony outside my bedchamber, I looked across the chaotic city I ruled.
Tyrosh glittered beneath me. Lanterns of red, blue, and green burned along the winding streets, their light reflected in domes of colored glass. Nightfires glowed in the market squares and along the waterfront, sending trails of sparks into the darkness.
Beyond the city walls, the harbor bristled with the masts of merchant ships, galleys, and broad-bellied cogs. At the northern point of the island, the Bleeding Tower guarded the harbor entrance, its watchfires burning as they did every night.
From this height, the city almost appeared peaceful.
I knew better than to think that.
If enemies were moving through Tyrosh, the watch should have found them. If sellswords were gathering, my informants should have carried word to me. If rival magisters were plotting, one of them should have betrayed the others for the right price.
In Tyrosh, every secret had a price, and gold was the best answer. Yet for almost a moon, no one had offered to sell me the truth, even when I had offered a heavy some from my treasury.
"You have been standing out there for an hour my love." my wife said from behind me, concerned, weighing upon every word.
I turned toward her.
She sat against the carved headboard of our bed, wrapped in a robe of purple silk. Her hair, dyed rose-pink, had been unbound for the night, but sleep had not touched her face.
"Come back inside my love." she urged, watching me with tired eyes. "Whatever troubles you will still be there in the morning."
"That is what concerns me, I have not even discovered what my troubles are." I replied, unable to keep the weariness from my voice.
Her expression tightened. She knew me too well to accept another evasion.
"Tell me what has happened, has the city worsened." she insisted, her concern sharpening into impatience.
I left the balcony and closed the doors behind me. For a moment, I considered offering some harmless complaint about harbor tariffs or a quarrel between ship captains. Then I looked at my wife and understood how little comfort a lie would offer if the danger was as grave as I feared.
"Yes I'm afraid it has… just yesterday Magister Qavo vanished," I told her at last. "His household claims he fled Tyrosh just as Magister Varro did, yet none of his ships passed the Bleeding Tower. That same night, the Brazen Shields company emptied their barracks and disappeared, along with two other free companies whose captains had sworn themselves to me."
"Gone where?" she asked, sitting straighter against the headboard.
"I do not know. I am afraid they have been killed in the city." I admitted, the words tasting bitter upon my tongue.
"And the men you sent to find them? Did they come back with any information." she pressed, searching my face for an answer.
I said nothing. The color drained from her face.
"None returned at all?" she whispered, her impatience giving way to fear.
"No, not even one," I answered grimly.
She drew the robe more tightly around herself.
"Why did you not tell me sooner?" she demanded, though the tremor in her voice robbed the words of much of their anger.
"Why did you not tell me sooner? Why didn't you speak of it during the meeting with Magister Qavo before he died?" she demanded, though the tremor in her voice robbed the words of much of their anger.
"Because I had no answers to give you," I admitted. "And because I did not know who was responsible, whom I could trust, or whether the danger had already reached this palace. I thought silence would spare you from fear until I understood what we faced. Had I sent the entire watch into the streets without knowing whom they were meant to seize, every rival I have would have accused me of preparing a purge."
"Perhaps a purge is needed, it will definitively frighten the truth from someone." she replied sharply.
"Or it could warn those responsible that I have discovered them." I countered, frustration hardening my voice.
"They have taken care of your allies and your spies." she said. Her voice remained steady, but fear had entered her eyes. "They already know you suspect something."
She pushed herself upright and held the robe closed at her throat.
"What of the red priests?" she asked uneasily. "Do you believe they are responsible?"
"I do not know." I admitted. "But I know that their crowds conceal whoever is. Tens of thousands now fill the streets whenever the priests light their fires."
"Then disperse them my love." she urged, desperation entering her voice.
"With whom?" I demanded more harshly than I intended. "The sellswords I trusted have vanished. I do not know which watch captains have been bought, or which magisters stand against me. If I send uncertain men to spill a red priest's blood, I may have a holy riot before the first corpse grows cold."
My wife flinched at my tone, but she did not look away.
"Then do not strike at the priests." she said firmly. "Protect yourself with more men. Summon the captains who remain loyal from the city watch. Close the harbor, seal the city gates, and call the conclave before dawn if you must, but do something before this grows worse."
I looked toward Tyrosh beyond the balcony doors.
She was right.
For weeks, I had waited for certainty while my enemies stripped away every man I could rely upon. My caution had accomplished nothing except to give my enemies more time to grow in strength as I weakened.
"I will send for the commander of my household guard." I decided, my hesitation finally giving way to action. "Then I will summon the members of the conclave who remain loyal and place the watch under my direct…"
A scream rose from the courtyard below.
It ended abruptly.
My wife and I stared at one another.
Then steel struck steel. Men shouted. Boots thundered across stone. Another scream tore through the night, followed by the deep blast of a guard's horn. The note had scarcely begun before it broke into a wet, choking silence.
I rushed onto the balcony. I witnessed men dying across the pale courtyard tiles.
Some wore the green-and-silver armor of my household guard, their gilded helms fashioned into the likenesses of hawks, hounds, and snarling beasts. The survivors fought in scattered groups beneath the lanterns, desperately trying to hold the doors leading into the palace.
They were losing.
Figures in red cloaks and dark armor moved among them. I could not count their number. They poured from every archway and passage, striking with the discipline of men who knew precisely where they were going.
One group seized the gatehouse while another cut down the guards protecting the eastern stairs. More emerged from the servants' wing. They had come from within my own palace.
That was impossible.
The outer gates had sounded no alarm. No scaling ladders rested against the walls. No ram battered the gate, and no army waited beyond the palace.
Yet armed men already held the courtyard. They were already beneath my chambers.
"Intruders!" a man shouted from the corridor, terror sharpening his warning. "Protect the Archon!"
The cry was followed by the crash of a door and a chorus of terrified voices.
My wife joined me upon the balcony.
"What is happening my love?" she whispered, clutching the front of her robe with both hands.
I seized her shoulders and pushed her back into the chamber.
"Fetch your shoes and a cloak." I ordered, struggling to master my fear. "Fetch nothing else, Quickly now!"
"Where do we go?" she asked, panic widening her eyes.
I had no answer.
Moments later, two guards stood outside our bedchamber. Beyond them lay a private stair descending to the kitchens and a concealed passage leading toward the western gardens. If either route remained open, we might reach the stables before the intruders surrounded the palace.
I crossed the chamber and pulled open the door.
The two guards nearly fell inside. One had lost his helmet. Blood ran from a cut above the other man's eye.
"Archon, you must come with us quickly!" the older guard gasped, glancing fearfully down the corridor.
"How many men breached the palace?" I demanded.
"We do not know." he admitted between labored breaths.
"Where is Captain Naro?" I asked, already dreading the answer.
"Dead, my lord," the guard answered, desperation filling his face. He gestured toward the private stair. "They have taken the lower hall and the eastern steps. We must reach the hidden passage before…"
Something moved at the far end of the corridor.
The guard fell silent.
A lone figure emerged from the shadows.
He stood six and a half feet tall. A red cloak hung from his broad shoulders, its hood drawn low over his face. Beneath it, he wore black westerosi armor from throat to heel. He carried no visible sword, spear, or axe, yet he stepped over the countless bodies in the corridor without the slightest hesitation.
My guards moved in front of me.
"Halt at once Intruder!" the older man commanded, though his sword trembled in his hand.
The stranger kept walking.
"One more step and…" the guard warned, his threat dying as the man in black moved.
I saw the stranger's shoulders shift and heard a sharp metallic scrape. Three claws slid from between the knuckles of each fist. They were longer than daggers and gleamed like polished silver.
My guards tried to raise their weapons. They were too slow.
The stranger crossed the distance between them in less than a heartbeat. His right hand swept upward. The first guard's sword struck the floor with the man's severed hand still curled around its hilt. Before he could scream, the claws passed through his throat.
The second guard thrust his spear.
The stranger twisted aside. One black-clad arm caught the shaft while the other drove three metal blades through the guard's breastplate as though it were parchment.
He tore the claws free. Both men collapsed at my feet.
For a moment, I could not move.
I had seen men die. No Archon of Tyrosh could hold power without witnessing bloodshed. I had ordered executions, survived riots, and watched sellsword companies settle quarrels in the streets.
I had never seen armored men killed so effortlessly.
The stranger filled the doorway, his claws wet with blood.
I retreated until the backs of my legs struck the bed. My wife clutched my arm, and I pulled her behind me, though the gesture felt pitiful. If the stranger wished to kill us, my body would not delay him for an instant.
Footsteps sounded in the corridor.
Another man entered the chamber. A red cloak hung from his shoulders, stained dark with blood from shoulder to hem. A jointed metal wrist contraption enclosed one hand and forearm, and red drops fell steadily from it.
The man with the claws did not turn toward him.
"Is it done, have all enemies in the palace been eliminated?" he asked in common tongue, his voice young and unnervingly calm.
"Yes," the newcomer confirmed in the common tongue with a respectful inclination of his head. "All three hundred of our swords are inside the palace. We hold the inner gate, the armory, both barracks, and every stair leading to this floor. The surviving guards have yielded."
Three hundred.
The palace housed fewer than two hundred guards in peacetime, and many would have been sleeping when the attack began. Thousands more manned the city walls, the watch barracks, the harbor, and the Bleeding Tower, but none could reach me while the palace gates remained sealed.
Even so, three hundred armed men could not simply walk through Tyrosh unnoticed.
They would have needed lodgings, weapons, provisions, keys, and guides. They would have needed passage through guarded districts and entrances known only to servants, officers, and those familiar with the palace.
They would have needed allies.
"And the city situation?" the hooded man asked, still showing no interest in either my wife or me.
"Quiet my lord," his companion reported, as though speaking of nothing more troubling than the night's weather. "The watch captains received orders to remain at their posts. The harbor guard believes this is a private quarrel among the magisters. The men promised by our allies in the conclave hold the surrounding streets."
My stomach clenched.
The magisters who remained were the same men who had smiled across my table, sworn loyalty before the Conclave, and begged favors of me only days earlier. Someone whom I had believed to be my ally must've opened the doors of my own palace to the enemy.
"Leave us at once." the hooded stranger ordered in the common with quiet authority.
"As you command my lord." the newcomer replied, bowing his head without hesitation.
He stepped back into the corridor and pulled the doors shut behind him.
The sound of fighting had begun to fade. What remained was worse: scattered pleas, the groans of the wounded, and the steady tramp of unfamiliar soldiers taking possession of my home.
The stranger's claws slid back into his hands with a metallic whisper. Then he reached up and lowered his hood.
Locks of red hair framed a smooth silver mask that covered his face from brow to chin. It had been fashioned into the serene likeness of a young man, with a straight nose, closed lips, and narrow openings for the eyes. Its expression was neither kind nor cruel.
It was simply still.
Lamplight glided across the polished silver as he stepped over the dead guards and entered my bedchamber.
I tried to summon the authority with which I had faced rebellious captains and hostile magisters.
"Mongrel intruder, do you know who I am?" I demanded in the Common Tongue. The words came haltingly, but I forced strength into my voice.
"Yes." he answered in tyroshi without the slightest interest.
"Then you know this city will tear itself apart before it accepts…" I switched back to tyroshi, anger rising at how easily he dismissed me.
"Which god do you worship?" he interrupted, tilting his silver face toward me.
The question silenced me. Of all the threats and demands I had expected, that was not among them.
"What?" I asked, my authority faltering beneath my confusion.
He came closer.
"When death enters your home, which god do you call upon to save you?" he asked quietly.
My wife's fingers tightened around my sleeve.
"Trios," I answered after a moment's hesitation. "The Three-Headed Trios."
The masked man glanced toward the gilded idol in the alcove beside our bed. It was a smaller likeness of the great statue outside the Temple of Trios: three heads rising from a single neck, their faces turned in different directions.
"Trios." he repeated, studying the idol.
The masked man looked from the idol to the bodies at his feet.
"Three faces," he murmured with quiet contempt. "Three mouths, yet not one of them whispered a warning to you."
His eyes returned to mine through the narrow openings in the mask.
"You worship a false god," he declared with absolute certainty.
Anger briefly overcame my fear.
"You invade my home, butcher my men, and dare speak to me of false…" I shouted, only for the accusation to die when he raised one hand.
Fire erupted from his palm.
My wife screamed.
The bedchamber blazed with sudden light. Flames coiled around the stranger's fingers and raced up his forearm, bright enough to drive every shadow from the room. Heat struck my face. The curtains snapped in the rush of burning air, and the stench of scorched flesh filled my lungs.
I stumbled backward.
The fire consumed his hand and forearm. Skin blackened and split. Flesh burned away, exposing glistening tendons for a heartbeat before those vanished as well.
Beneath them lay no pale human bone. His skeleton shone like silver steel. With a soft metallic scrape, three gleaming claws extended from the ruined hand and into the flames.
He watched me throughout it all. He did not cry out, he did not even tremble.
Only his green eyes moved behind the silver mask, studying my horror.
Then the fire vanished.
The bones of his hand remained bare. I could see every metal joint flex as he slowly curled his fingers. No trick of the light could explain it, no hidden blade could account for the naked framework of his arm.
Before my eyes, raw red flesh began to creep across the metal.
Muscle wound itself around the shining bones in glistening strands. Veins spread through the new flesh like roots beneath soil. Skin flowed over everything, smooth and unmarked. Within moments, the arm that had burned to the bone was whole again.
The claws remained extended, untouched by the flames.
"Fire cleanses the flesh." he said with a soft horrifying chuckle.
My wife released me. She fell to her knees beside the bed and bent forward until her brow touched the floor.
"Mercy my lord," she begged, her shoulders shaking beneath her purple robe. "Please have mercy on us."
"Get up," I told her, humiliated by the sight of my wife kneeling before him.
She did not move.
"Get up at once!" I shouted again, but my voice cracked and betrayed my fear.
The masked man regarded her prostrate form in silence. Satisfaction gleamed in his eyes.
"She understands the power i hold, yet you still haven't." He observed calmly.
"It is a trick, yes it's nothing but a trick…" I whispered, speaking as much to myself as to him.
I clung to the words because the alternative was madness.
Some powder had produced the flames, foreign armor lay beneath false skin. The heat, the smell, the metal bones, and the flesh weaving itself together, all of it had to be an illusion.
Men did not burn without pain, men did not regrow what fire consumed, men could not carry shining claws inside their bodies.
The masked man lifted his restored hand. He seemed to taunt my mind as flames blossomed in his palm once more.
This time, I did not speak.
"Look at me, look at the fire." he commanded, the force in his voice compelling my obedience.
I raised my eyes to the silver mask and toward his shiny green eyes reflected by the fire.
"Your god did not warn you of my arrival." he said, his voice calm as the flame rose higher. "He did not protect your allies, return your spies and guards, or even defend your palace. You prayed beneath his three faces while I took your city from you, one street, one captain, and one magister at a time."
The fire climbed between us.
"When darkness entered your home, Trios gave you silence." he continued. "I will now offer you fire."
My thoughts began to fracture as I looked toward the idol of Trios. Its three golden faces stared past me, blind and silent.
I looked toward my wife, trembling upon the floor. I looked toward the guards who had died before they could complete a single strike. Then I looked at the living flame in the stranger's bare hand.
"Who are you?...What are you?" I asked, the last of my defiance deserting me.
He tilted his silver face toward me.
"Don't you know by now Archon Torreo Naris, I am Azor Ahai come again," he proclaimed with solemn certainty. "Champion of R'hllor, and the Lord's chosen against the darkness."
He closed his fingers, smothering the flame without leaving so much as a mark upon his skin.
"You will remain Archon of Tyrosh," he said, each word delivered as a command rather than an offer. "The conclave will vote as you command, the watch will patrol the streets, the harbor will remain open, and by sunrise the city will appear no different than it did before my arrival."
Hope stirred within me, small, shameful, and desperate.
"In return, you will serve me," he continued, watching that hope take root. "You will acknowledge me before all your remaining magisters allies, your captains, and your people. You will keep the city open to the faithful and grant the red temple land, coin, and protection. My priests will preach without hindrance, and when more of my followers come to Tyrosh, your gates and harbor will remain open to them."
He stopped before me.
"You will stand beside me and proclaim what you witnessed tonight," he finished coldly. "Serve me, and you may keep your seat and your life. Refuse, and the remaining conclave will choose another Archon before your corpse is cold."
There was no doubt what would become of me if I refused. Nor what would become of my wife or anyone in the palace who still bore my name.
Yet fear alone did not bend my knees.
Fear could explain the dead men in the corridor, even treachery could explain the three hundred swords inside my walls. Gold could explain the silence of the watch and the betrayal of the magisters.
None of it though could explain the fire from the man. None of it could explain the metal beneath his flesh. None of it could explain a body rebuilding itself before my eyes.
Trios had three faces and three mouths. Not one had answered me in all my life.
The man before me though had showed me a supernatural sight. Fire had burned him to the bone and he healed without so much as a cry. Whatever he was, he had shown me more power in a few moments than Trios had shown me in a lifetime.
My wife raised her head and looked at me through tear-filled eyes.
"Please, kneel, my love." she whispered desperately.
The claws withdrew into the stranger's hand. He extended it toward me.
"WIll it be eternal servitude or death, Choose now." he ordered, patient and certain of my answer.
My city was lost, my allies were nowhere to be seen, my palace guards lay dead, and every road from the chamber belonged to him.
Perhaps I knelt to save my life, perhaps I knelt because my mind could no longer endure what I had seen. Or perhaps, in that moment, I truly believed in his previous words, his claim of being Azor Ahai.
I lowered myself beside my wife and bowed my head.
"I will serve you loyally, my lord." I whispered, surrendering the last of my resistance.
And so I knelt.
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Chapter 76 Coming soon…