Chapter 20: The Tyroshi Fire, A Dragon's Debt
The task of silencing Horonno, the Tyroshi master armorer, and plundering his secrets, was a challenge that resonated with every predatory instinct Rico Moretti possessed. It was not merely an assassination for his Green paymasters; it was a direct investment in his own burgeoning power, a chance to absorb a skill set that could forge empires and win wars. The Red Keep's workshops, bustling with craftsmen vital to the Green war effort, were a dangerous, well-guarded labyrinth, but Horonno's unique talents made him a jewel worth the peril.
Intelligence was the anvil upon which Rico forged his plan. Finn's terrified Red Keep servants, now subtly augmented by a few low-level artisans Mathis had managed to indebt, painted a picture of Horonno: a reclusive, fiercely proud man, fiercely protective of his forge and his unique Tyroshi steel-folding techniques. He worked late, often alone, in a small, private workshop attached to the main armory, a privilege granted due to his irreplaceable skills. Security was tight, with Kingsguard and household guards patrolling the area, but Horonno himself, confident in his value, often dismissed personal guards when engrossed in his work.
Alaric, ever the scholar, delved into texts on Tyroshi guilds and metallurgy. "Tyroshi steel is not merely folded, Master Razor," he explained, his eyes alight with academic zeal. "There are whispers of… alchemical treatments, of specific quenching rituals under certain moon phases, that imbue the metal with its characteristic strength and lightness. Horonno may not just be a smith; he might be a keeper of generational secrets, almost a… metal-sorcerer."
This only whetted Rico's appetite further. He didn't plan a simple ambush. He wanted Horonno alive, at least initially. He wanted the Tyroshi to speak of his secrets, to demonstrate his techniques, before his essence was consumed. This required a more delicate touch than a simple blade in the dark.
His chosen team was small, precise: Shiv, for his unparalleled stealth and silent takedowns; Vorian, the pragmatic ex-sellsword, for his combat prowess and ability to handle unexpected complications; and Lyra the Lyseni, with a specially prepared fast-acting soporific draught, potent enough to incapacitate a strong man quickly without killing him outright – a "Tyroshi Lullaby," as she chillingly called it. Perwyn forged a work order, purportedly from the Master of Arms himself, requesting Horonno's immediate consultation on a matter of urgent blade repair for Prince Aemond's personal guard – a document that would grant them legitimate, if brief, access to the workshop's vicinity.
The operation was set for the hour of the wolf, when the Red Keep was at its quietest, its corridors echoing with the snores of a city on edge. Dressed in the nondescript, dark attire of castle servants, they moved through the labyrinthine passages, Rico's absorbed knowledge of the Keep (from Tommen Lannister and his own scrying) guiding their steps. He felt the familiar thrum of anticipation, the cold focus that descended before a high-stakes play.
They reached the armory complex. The main forges were cold, the vast space filled with the ghostly silhouettes of anvils and quenching troughs. A single Kingsguard knight, Ser Jonothor Byrch, stood vigil at the entrance to the corridor leading to Horonno's private workshop, his white cloak a stark beacon in the gloom.
Ser Jonothor was known for his diligence. A direct confrontation was too risky. Rico, relying on his scryed knowledge of the knight's patrol patterns, had anticipated this. While Shiv melted into the deeper shadows, creating a subtle auditory diversion – a scraped stone, a falling tool – further down a connecting passage, Rico and Vorian, carrying a covered crate (supposedly containing Prince Aemond's damaged blades), approached Ser Jonothor.
"Urgent business with Master Horonno, Ser Knight," Rico said, his voice respectfully low, Perwyn's forged order held out. "From the Master of Arms. Prince Aemond's service."
Ser Jonothor, a stern, unsmiling man, took the parchment, his eyes scanning it critically in the dim torchlight. The diversionary sound, faint but distinct, made him glance down the other corridor. "What was that?"
"Rats, Ser, most like," Vorian said smoothly. "The place is riddled with them."
As Jonothor's attention was momentarily divided, Shiv struck. Not with a blade, but with a sand-filled cosh, expertly applied to the back of the knight's head. Ser Jonothor crumpled without a sound, his fall cushioned by Vorian's quick intervention. Rico was there instantly, a hand on the Kingsguard's helm.
The essence flooded him: years of rigorous Kingsguard training, unwavering loyalty (to the institution, if not entirely to the current Green regime, Rico noted with interest), a deep knowledge of the Red Keep's defenses and protocols, and a surprising, stoic piety. It was a clean, disciplined essence, devoid of the moral murkiness of his usual acquisitions. It sharpened his own martial discipline, his tactical awareness of fortified positions, and, unexpectedly, gave him a more nuanced understanding of the chivalric code, even as he systematically violated it. He now also knew Ser Jonothor's personal patrol route deviations and his private concerns about King Aegon's excesses. Valuable.
They dragged the unconscious knight into a storage alcove, bound and gagged him. There would be time to decide his ultimate fate later. For now, Horonno awaited.
The door to the Tyroshi's workshop was heavy oak, reinforced with iron. No lock was visible; it was likely barred from within. Rico listened, his enhanced senses picking up the rhythmic clang of a hammer, the hiss of a bellows. Horonno was working late, as predicted.
Rico knocked, a specific pattern the Master of Arms might use. "Master Horonno! Urgent message regarding Prince Aemond's commission!"
The hammering stopped. A gruff voice, thick with a Tyroshi accent, called out, "Enter, if it be true business. The door is unbarred."
Rico pushed the door open slowly. The workshop was a smith's dream, or nightmare, depending on one's perspective. It was small, cramped, but meticulously organized, every tool in its place. The heat from the forge was intense, the air thick with the smell of hot metal, coal smoke, and strange, acrid chemicals Alaric would have recognized. Horonno himself stood before his anvil, a massively built man with arms like tree trunks, his face, framed by a singed leather apron and a thick, braided black beard, set in a permanent scowl. He held a glowing piece of steel in a pair of tongs, his eyes, narrowed against the heat, suspicious.
"What is this urgent matter?" Horonno grunted, not looking away from his work.
Rico stepped inside, Vorian and Lyra flanking him, Shiv a silent shadow at the door. "A change in Prince Aemond's specifications, Master Horonno," Rico said, his voice calm. "He requires… a more personal consultation."
Horonno finally turned, his eyes, the color of dark, polished steel themselves, fixing on Rico. He was no fool. He saw the way they moved, the predatory stillness about them. His hand tightened on the tongs, the glowing metal a makeshift weapon. "I know of no such change. Who sent you?"
"Those who appreciate true craftsmanship, Master Horonno," Rico replied. "And who are prepared to pay… dearly… for its secrets."
Horonno's scowl deepened. "My secrets are not for sale, gutter-spawn. Nor for the taking by Hightower's lackeys. Leave now, or you will feel the kiss of true Tyroshi fire."
He lunged, not with the tongs, but with a smith's hammer he snatched from his belt, swinging it with surprising speed and devastating force. Vorian moved to intercept, his Myrish short sword flashing. The clang of steel against iron rang through the workshop.
Horonno was a bull of a man, his strength immense, his every blow carrying the weight of years spent shaping unyielding metal. Vorian, though skilled, was pushed back.
This was Rico's cue. He didn't engage Horonno directly in a contest of brute strength. He moved with the lethal grace he was cultivating, his bastard sword a blur. He used Duncan's unorthodox footwork to evade the Tyroshi's powerful swings, Kellen's precision to find openings in the smith's defense.
The workshop became a chaotic dance of fire and steel. Sparks flew as swords glanced off anvils, tools clattered to the stone floor. Lyra, seeing an opportunity as Horonno overextended himself against Vorian, darted in, a small, almost invisible atomizer in her hand. A fine mist sprayed towards the Tyroshi's face.
Horonno roared, batting it away, but he'd inhaled some of the "Tyroshi Lullaby." His movements became a fraction slower, his eyes losing some of their focus. He shook his massive head, trying to clear it, but the potent soporific was already working its way into his system.
Rico pressed his advantage. He disengaged from a direct clash, instead using the environment, forcing Horonno to stumble over a pile of metal ingots. As the giant Tyroshi momentarily lost his balance, Rico struck, not with the edge of his blade, but with the flat, aiming for Horonno's temple. It wasn't a killing blow, but it was enough. The master armorer sagged, his eyes rolling back, and collapsed like a felled oak amidst the tools of his trade.
"Secure him," Rico ordered, his breath coming in ragged gasps. "Quickly. Lyra, how long will he be under?"
"Deeply enough for our purposes, Master Razor," Lyra said, checking the Tyroshi's pulse. "But not indefinitely. An hour, perhaps two, before he begins to stir."
They bound Horonno to his own sturdy workbench. Rico then began his "interrogation." He didn't need information about Black sympathizers. He needed the secrets of Tyroshi steel.
"Master Horonno," Rico said, his voice soft but firm, as the Tyroshi began to groan, his eyelids fluttering. "You are a master of your craft. A craft I… admire. You will share your knowledge with me. Your folding techniques. Your quenching rituals. The… alchemical treatments… Alaric spoke of."
Horonno, still groggy but his pride fiercely intact, spat a curse in his native Tyroshi, a language Rico now understood with perfect clarity thanks to Malatesta. "Never, whelp! These secrets die with me!"
"Perhaps," Rico conceded. "But your death can be… protracted. Or it can be swift. And your essence, your jēdar, Master Horonno… that, I will have regardless." He let the Valyrian term hang in the air, a subtle hint of the deeper knowledge he possessed.
He didn't resort to crude torture. Instead, he used a combination of Lyra's more subtle chemical persuasions – compounds that didn't inflict pain, but induced a state of disorientation and heightened suggestibility – and his own increasingly potent "blood sense," subtly pressing on Horonno's will, exploiting the man's pride in his craft, his desire for his legacy to endure, even if only in the mind of his captor.
It was a slow, painstaking process. Hours passed. Horonno, his will gradually eroded, began to speak, at first reluctantly, then with a craftsman's grudging respect for Rico's unnervingly precise questions (informed by Alaric's research and Rico's own burgeoning understanding of metallurgy from lesser absorptions). He spoke of the seventeen sacred folds, of quenching oils infused with rare volcanic salts, of a final tempering process conducted under the dark of the moon, involving chants in an ancient dialect of Old Tyrosh. He even, with great reluctance, revealed the location of a hidden compartment in his forge where he kept his personal notes and a small cache of the unique chemical catalysts he used.
Rico absorbed it all, his mind a voracious sponge. Perwyn, who had been brought in under heavy guard once Horonno was subdued, meticulously copied the Tyroshi's notes, his forger's skill perfectly replicating the smith's crabbed handwriting.
Finally, as the first hint of dawn began to stain the sky outside the Red Keep, Horonno was spent, his secrets laid bare. He looked at Rico, a flicker of understanding, and perhaps even a strange kind of respect, in his weary eyes. "You… you are no common thief, boy. What manner of creature are you?"
"I am the future, Master Horonno," Rico said softly. And then, with a swift, clean thrust of Krayn's dagger, he ended the Tyroshi's life.
The essence that flooded Rico was unlike anything he had experienced before. It wasn't the raw strength of a warrior or the cunning of a spymaster. It was a universe of intricate, tactile knowledge. He felt the weight of the hammer in his hand, the heat of the forge on his skin, the subtle vibrations of metal yielding to his will. He understood the soul of steel, the secret language of fire and quenching waters, the precise alchemy that transformed raw ore into legendary blades and impenetrable armor. The seventeen sacred folds, the alchemical treatments, the quenching rituals – they were not just memories; they were now ingrained in his very being, as if he had spent a lifetime at the forge.
He stood there for a long moment, the power of it thrumming through him, his mind reeling with the sheer artistry and ancient wisdom he now possessed. This was a different kind of power, a creative force, a stark contrast to the purely destructive or manipulative essences he had mostly absorbed before.
Vorian and Shiv, meanwhile, had meticulously cleaned the workshop, removing any trace of their presence, making Horonno's death look like a tragic accident – a fall into his own forge, perhaps, or a mishap with volatile chemicals. They took Horonno's notes, his tools, and the cache of catalysts. The unconscious Ser Jonothor Byrch was left bound in the alcove, to be discovered later, his "failure" to protect the armorer a convenient scapegoat that would deflect suspicion from Rico's "official" persona.
Rico delivered a sanitized report to Larys Graceford: Horonno had proven uncooperative and had died during a "regrettable struggle while resisting questioning." His workshop, sadly, had caught fire, destroying any sensitive documents. Larys, while disappointed at the lack of immediate intelligence on Black plots, was mollified by the removal of a suspected traitor and the convenient (if fictitious) destruction of his workshop. The Greens had their silence. Rico had his secrets.
News of a significant Green defeat arrived from the Riverlands shortly thereafter – the Battle at the Burning Mill, a bloody rout where Jason Lannister himself was slain. The mood in the Red Keep turned even darker, the paranoia more intense. Otto Hightower, his face a mask of grim resolve, pushed for harsher measures against any suspected Black sympathizers. The war was escalating, its brutal demands growing daily.
Rico, however, felt a new, profound sense of empowerment. He now possessed the knowledge to forge weapons and armor that could rival any in the Seven Kingdoms. He could equip his own men, create unique tools for his organization, perhaps even, one day, forge a blade worthy of a king – or a god.
In the depths of his warehouse, beside the whispering Valyrian scrolls and the cold obsidian mirror, Rico Moretti began to sketch designs in the dirt floor with a piece of charcoal – designs for a new kind of armor, for a sword unlike any seen before, its forging informed by the fire of Tyrosh and the blood magic of Old Valyria. The Spider in the King's Court was also becoming a Master of the Forge. And the Dance of the Dragons had just gained a terrifyingly versatile new player, one whose ambitions were as boundless as the ancient power he was beginning to master.