Viserys I — Chapter III: The Mountain Breathes
The mountain breathed.
That was the first thought Viserys often had when he walked the lower halls of Dragonstone at dawn. The air was warm, tasting faintly of brimstone and salt. The stones beneath his slippers thrummed with a pulse he could almost feel in his bones — the island's slow, molten heart.
The dragonpit lay beneath him, though pit was far too crude a word. It was no cage, no tamed yard of iron and smoke like the maesters would one day raise in King's Landing. This was an open wound in the mountain, a labyrinth of black rock and red fire. The dragons roamed where they willed, coiling through the heat-veins of the earth, their low rumblings echoing through the keep like thunder in the belly of a god.
Sometimes, when the wind was right, their roars rolled through the halls. It set the tapestries trembling and sent the servants scurrying. But Viserys only smiled at the sound.
They are the song of our blood, he thought. The last music of Valyria.
This morning the air carried the faint scent of ash and the whisper of waves striking the cliffs below. A pleasant morning, as pleasant as any could be upon this brooding isle.
He had come here seeking peace before the day's burdens began — peace from the endless scrolls of court, from Lord Lyonel's letters and the ceaseless need to balance coin against honor, promise against truth. But peace was not easily found these days.
Aemma's confinement had left her frail still, though she hid it well. The babes, Maekar and Rhaenyra, grew fast and strong — dragonborn, both. Yet the sight of them filled Viserys with something he could not name. Pride, yes, but also fear. The gods had given him two heirs, twins of remarkable likeness, and with them came the weight of a thousand questions no father should ever need to ask.
Which one will the realm follow, should it come to it? Which one will the dragons favor?
He rubbed the base of his thumb where his signet ring pressed too tight. The band was gold, worked into the shape of a coiling dragon, nothing so grand as a king's seal — yet even that small weight had begun to trouble him.
When he returned to Aemma's solar, sunlight had broken through the morning haze, glinting off the sea beyond the windows. His wife was seated by the brazier, pale hair loose about her shoulders. The maester had left her with a cup of broth and strict orders to rest, but she never did as she was told. Two carved cradles stood beside her chair, each lined with crimson silk.
"You should be abed still," Viserys said softly.
"I am abed, near enough," Aemma replied. Her smile was tired but warm. "They sleep better when they hear my voice."
Viserys stepped close, drawn as he always was to the tiny, impossible lives that had come from her. Rhaenyra lay still as a doll, her face soft and round, her breath gentle as the tide. Maekar, by contrast, had one fist curled around the edge of his blanket, as if prepared to strike.
"They are perfect," Aemma said.
"They are loud," he teased. "Like their grandsire Baelon. He could wake a keep with his snoring."
Aemma chuckled faintly, then winced — the motion pulled at the healing wound beneath her gown. "You will spoil them before they can walk."
"Let them be spoiled a little. The world will teach them harshness soon enough."
He brushed his fingers across Maekar's tiny hand. The boy's grip was startlingly strong. "He'll be a fighter."
"And she will rule," Aemma murmured.
He glanced at her, half-amused, half-alarmed. "You've chosen their fates already?"
"It's in her eyes," Aemma said. "Rhaenyra watches everything. Maekar—" she paused, frowning thoughtfully, "—he looks at people the way the dragons look at fire. As though he understands it."
Viserys laughed softly. "A strange thing to say of a babe."
"Strange children, from strange parents," Aemma said, though her tone was fond.
When she turned back to the window, Viserys found his thoughts drifting to his own father — to Prince Baelon, bold and bright, gone too soon. Duty had fallen to Viserys before he was ready, as it always did. Now it loomed again, heavier still.
That afternoon, he met with his brother Daemon in the lower hall, where the sea-winds moaned through cracks in the stone. Daemon was fresh from a morning flight, his hair wild, his armor spattered with ash.
"You flew Caraxes again," Viserys said, half reproach, half admiration.
"The Blood Wyrm grows restless when kept ground-bound," Daemon replied with a grin. "And so do I."
Viserys sighed. "You'll turn him mad with all your showing off."
"Better mad than dull," Daemon said. He took a flagon of wine from a passing servant, drank deep, then studied his brother. "You've the look of a man haunted by council chambers again."
"I am haunted by everything of late."
Daemon leaned against the table. "You've heirs now. You should be smiling."
"I am. Most days." Viserys hesitated. "Sometimes I think of Father. What he might say if he saw them. The council speaks of succession even now, Daemon. Of Rhaenys's claim, of the bloodlines, the usual chatter."
Daemon's grin sharpened. "Let them chatter. The dragons will decide, in the end."
Would that it were so simple, Viserys thought. But aloud he said only, "I envy your certainty."
Daemon clapped his shoulder. "You were always too soft for this world, brother. That's why they'll follow you."
Later that evening, as the sun drowned itself in the Narrow Sea, Viserys stood once more by the window of his solar. The twins slept soundly beside Aemma's bed, each with a dragon's egg nestled beside them — Rhaenyra's pale gold, Maekar's deep black streaked with violet.
The maester had said it was custom, a symbol of Valyrian blood. But Viserys had seen the faint shimmer of heat that pulsed through Maekar's egg when the torches dimmed.
He thought of the mountain's rumbling heart, of the roars that shook the stone, and shivered.
"Sleep well, my children," he murmured. "May the gods make your fires gentle."
Outside, a low thunder rolled through the night — not from the sky, but from beneath the earth. The dragons were stirring again.
And high above the waves, the mountain breathed.