Chapter 25: The Dragon's Peace, The Serpent's Designs
The Seven Kingdoms lay under a pall of stunned, fearful silence. The whirlwind of King Joffrey's fiery ascension, Eddard Stark's public humiliation and subsequent exile, Lord Baelish's gruesome end, and the miraculous, terrifying return of living dragons had shattered the old paradigms of power. The initial, bold rebellions, fueled by outrage and ambition, now seemed like the rash acts of children who had foolishly poked a slumbering behemoth. NJ, from his seat on the Iron Throne – a seat that now felt increasingly like a dragon's perch – surveyed the shifting landscape of Westeros with cold, analytical satisfaction. His gambits had paid off. The realm was cowed. For now.
The Scattered Embers of Defiance
Ravens brought daily tidings to the Red Keep, painting a picture of his enemies' disarray.
Robb Stark, the Young Wolf, had reportedly retreated northwards from the Riverlands, his great host withered to a shadow of its former strength. The Northern lords, their proud honor deeply wounded by their liege lord's public confession and their fear of Joffrey's dragons warring with their stubborn independence, were said to be in disarray. Some had taken their remaining men home, ostensibly to defend their own lands against a king who commanded fire. Others urged Robb to bend the knee, to salvage what he could for the North. NJ knew the North would not be so easily broken, but their offensive capabilities were, for the moment, shattered. He dispatched a raven to Winterfell, addressed to Lady Catelyn Stark and her son, Robb. It was a simple message: "The King demands your fealty. Swear your oaths, and your lives and lands may be spared. Defy him further, and his dragons will teach the North the meaning of true winter." Attached to the scroll was a single, perfectly formed obsidian scale, shed by Valerion. A token. A promise.
Stannis Baratheon, that iron-willed man of grim principle, remained defiant on Dragonstone. His fleet was still formidable, his island fortress nigh impregnable to conventional assault. But his land-based support had evaporated. Lords who had once seen him as the rightful, lawful king now saw him as a stubborn fool leading them to certain annihilation against a sorcerer-king. Melisandre of Asshai, NJ learned through Varys's reports, was his constant companion, her influence growing. She preached of a great war between fire and ice, of Stannis as a prophesied hero, but her sermons now had to contend with the undeniable reality of another, younger king who wielded fire magic far more spectacularly than any red priestess. NJ knew Stannis was a problem that would require a more direct, and perhaps more magical, solution in time. For now, he was a contained threat.
Renly Baratheon's fate was more definitive. The whispers NJ had anticipated had solidified into near certainty: assassinated in his own tent, a victim of shadow magic, just as the Westeros of his memory dictated. Melisandre's work, no doubt, on behalf of Stannis. With Renly gone, his vast army of Stormlords and Reachmen, already demoralized by Joffrey's rise, had completely disintegrated. Many Stormlords, leaderless and terrified, sent tentative offers of submission to King's Landing.
The Roses Bend to the Dragon
The most significant consequence of Renly's demise and Joffrey's ascendance was the swift, pragmatic volte-face of House Tyrell. Lord Mace Tyrell, accompanied by his sons and the formidable Lady Olenna (whom NJ knew from his GoT knowledge was the true political genius of their house, though she had not travelled to King's Landing herself, sending her influence with her son), arrived in King's Landing with a magnificent retinue, all humility and effusive declarations of loyalty.
The formal betrothal of King Joffrey to Lady Margaery Tyrell was announced with great pomp in the Throne Room. The chamber itself seemed to hum with the power of the two young dragons, Aurum and Glacian, who flanked the Iron Throne on specially constructed golden perches, their jewel-like eyes observing the proceedings with unnerving intelligence, their presence radiating a subtle, intimidating heat.
NJ met Margaery Tyrell for the first time in a private audience, Cersei present as Queen Regent, though her contributions were largely performative. Margaery was as beautiful and charming as the tales suggested, her smile warm, her courtesies impeccable. But NJ's truth-sense, augmented by his weirwood and dragon perceptions, cut through the veneer. He felt her keen intellect, her carefully concealed ambition, her family's desperate maneuvering to align themselves with the new, dominant power. She was a player, not a pawn.
"Your Grace," Margaery said, her voice like honeyed wine, her eyes wide with feigned admiration (though NJ sensed a genuine curiosity and perhaps a frisson of fear beneath it), "all of Highgarden, all the Reach, rejoices in your divine favor. The return of dragons is a blessing upon your reign, a sign that a new golden age is dawning for Westeros."
"Indeed, Lady Margaery," NJ replied, his Joffrey-voice carrying a hint of regal condescension. "The gods have made their will clear. Those who are wise will embrace it." He watched her reaction, sensing her quick mind analyzing his words, assessing his temperament. This alliance was necessary, a means to secure the wealth and manpower of the Reach, but he would not be charmed or manipulated by a pretty face and clever words. The Tyrells would serve his agenda.
Plans for the royal wedding were set in motion. It would be a spectacle unlike any seen in generations, a celebration designed to awe the realm, to display the wealth of the Lannisters and Tyrells, and above all, to showcase the terrifying, divine power of the Dragon King.
The Dragon's Expanding Shadow
His seven dragons were now truly magnificent beasts, their growth accelerated by his blood magic to a degree that defied nature. Valerion, his chosen mount, was the size of a small warhorse, his black scales shimmering with red highlights, his roar a physical blow. The others were not far behind. Their needs were prodigious. NJ commanded entire wings of the Red Keep to be converted into a sprawling dragonry, with heated chambers, vast stores of meat (the royal hunts now served a far more practical purpose than Robert's drunken sport), and teams of terrified servants and maesters (under NJ's direct, often terrifying, tutelage in Valyrian dragonlore) to tend to their needs.
He continued their training relentlessly. The dragons were intelligent, fiercely loyal to him, their minds linked to his through the blood bond and his growing mastery of Valyrian commands and telepathic suggestion. He taught them complex aerial maneuvers within the confines of the Dragonpit's ruins, their coordinated flights a breathtaking, terrifying spectacle. He honed their fire control, teaching them to unleash it with precision, to vary its intensity from a warning gout of smoke to an inferno capable of melting stone. He had even begun to experiment with rudimentary Valyrian battle formations, envisioning them as a perfectly synchronized squadron of living fire.
The flight over King's Landing on Valerion had cemented his legendary status. Ballads were sung in every tavern, from the meanest hovels of Flea Bottom to the gilded halls of noble manors, of "Joffrey the Dragonheart," "The Phoenix King," "The Last Dragon Lord Reborn." The smallfolk saw him as a figure of divine power, a king touched by gods, a savior or a scourge, but undeniably real in a way no king had been for centuries. This mythos was a weapon more potent than any army.
The Serpent's Studies, The Viper's Dance
NJ's personal development continued apace. He delved ever deeper into the Valyrian scrolls, his intellect unraveling secrets of blood magic, fire sorcery, and the forging of Valyrian steel that had been lost for millennia. He practiced with Umbraexys, the ancient Valyrian blade from Maegor's vault. He found that by channeling his internal dragon fire through the patterned steel, he could make the blade hum with a faint, dark heat, its edges seeming to hunger for blood. His skill with the sword, guided by Jaime's absorbed essence and his own preternatural coordination, was becoming formidable.
He also began to experiment with more ambitious Valyrian magic. Scrying rituals, using bowls of water infused with his blood and dragon scales, yielded clearer, if still fleeting, glimpses of distant events: Stannis pacing the ramparts of Dragonstone, Robb Stark holding a grim war council in the snow-dusted North, Tywin Lannister overseeing the brutal subjugation of a Riverlands castle. He even attempted, with some success, to subtly influence the dreams of certain key individuals – a servant close to a rival lord, planting seeds of fear or doubt. These were subtle probings, tests of his growing power, always conducted with extreme caution.
Prince Oberyn Martell remained in King's Landing, a charismatic and dangerous observer. He sought audiences with NJ, his conversations a delightful dance of veiled threats, subtle probes, and witty provocations. Oberyn was fascinated by the dragons, by Joffrey's power, and NJ sensed the Red Viper was assessing him, perhaps seeing a potential ally, or a future enemy, in Dorne's long game of vengeance against the Lannisters.
"Your dragons are magnificent, Your Grace," Oberyn purred during one such meeting in NJ's private solar, where Ignis, the molten gold dragon, lay coiled by the hearth, radiating an almost unbearable heat. "They remind one of the glories of Old Valyria. And of the Targaryens, with whom my house has… complex ties."
"Indeed, Prince Oberyn," NJ replied, his Joffrey-mask firmly in place, though his eyes held a knowing, draconic gleam. "The past has a way of reasserting itself. Those who are wise will adapt to the new realities." He let the unspoken implications hang in the air. Dorne would either be an ally, or ash. Oberyn's smile was all teeth.
The Hand of the Grandfather
The most significant new political variable was the impending arrival of Lord Tywin Lannister. Having largely crushed organized resistance in the Riverlands (his campaign a brutal object lesson in Lannister ruthlessness, all conducted in King Joffrey's name), the Old Lion was now marching towards King's Landing to assume his duties as Hand of the King.
NJ anticipated this with a mixture of cold respect and steely resolve. Tywin was a political and military genius, a man whose intellect NJ could appreciate. But he was also a creature of rigid control, accustomed to absolute obedience. He would expect to rule the realm through his grandson. He would be sorely mistaken.
NJ had no intention of being Tywin's puppet. His dragons, his magic, his own formidable intellect, gave him leverage no Lannister had ever possessed over their formidable patriarch. Their first meeting as King and Hand would be a subtle, but titanic, clash of wills. NJ looked forward to it.
The Captive Wolf, The Lost Cub
Sansa Stark remained a gilded prisoner in the Red Keep. Her father's "confession" and Joffrey's "mercy" had shattered her simple worldview, leaving her adrift in a sea of confusion, fear, and a reluctant, terrifying awe of her king. NJ treated her with calculated unpredictability. One day, he would subject her to Joffrey's cruel taunts, reminding her of her family's "treason." The next, he might display a moment of unexpected, almost gentle consideration – a comment on her needlework, an inquiry after her well-being – all designed to keep her emotionally off-balance, to break her spirit, or perhaps to mold her into something… useful. Her marriage to Margaery's brother, Loras, or some other Tyrell connection, was a possibility he considered, to further bind the Reach to his throne.
Arya Stark was still a ghost. Varys's little birds had found no trace of her. NJ was not overly concerned. A single, lost wolf cub was insignificant in the grand scheme of his ambitions. Though, he conceded, her Stark spirit, if allowed to fester, might one day become an irritant.
A New Valyria Rising
As the seasons began to turn, as the initial rebellions died down into smoldering embers, NJ stood on the precipice of a new era. His power was consolidating. His dragons were growing into weapons of unimaginable destruction. His knowledge of ancient magic was expanding daily. He was not merely a king; he was a force, an architect of a new age.
He looked out from the highest tower of Maegor's Holdfast, Valerion a vast, dark shadow perched on the battlements beside him, their minds linked in silent communion. The city of King's Landing sprawled below, a jewel he was recutting to his own design. Beyond it, Westeros, a continent to be reforged. And beyond that, the true, ancient enemy, the Long Night, for which all this – the wars, the magic, the dragons, the absolute power – was merely a prelude, a necessary forging of the sword that would defend the dawn.
His vision was no longer just of the Iron Throne, or even of a unified Westeros. It was of a new Valyria, rising not from the ashes of its Fourteen Flames, but from the heart of this war-torn continent, an empire of magic, order, and absolute will, with him, Joffrey, the Dragon Emperor, at its eternal center. The path would be paved with blood and fire, but the prize was a world remade, a world saved, a world utterly, irrevocably, his. The thought brought a cold, terrible smile to his lips, a smile that mirrored the predatory gleam in Valerion's molten gold eyes.