Ser Jaegaer Ilileon
Daemon's attack on Myr provoked a mixed response among the Westerosi fighting in the Stepstones: Ser Elston Tully, his men, and the greater part of the stormlanders sang praises to Daemon's valor and lamented that they had not seen the battle nor partaken in it; Lord Tarth and Lord Estermont chose to hold their tongues, as did Jaegaer himself. Lord Velaryon, however, did not remain silent. At first, the former Volantene marveled at how a warrior, fleet commander, merchant, and, judging by the tales, great traveler managed to coexist within this man, yet battles and dangers allow one to see men as they truly are.
When the weary Hand-Cousin returned to Bloodstone upon a dragon savage from wounds and recounted his vengeance against the Myrmen, silence fell in his tent where the small war council had gathered. When the initial shock passed, the Admiral hissed:
"Do you realize what you have done?"
"If you listened poorly, My Lord, I can repeat it," Daemon drawled lazily, and the sloth and fatigue in his voice were clearly not feigned. "I attacked the Free City of Myr, which is part of the Triarchy with whom we are at war. My dragon burned its port and walls; the fire born of his flame scorched all the palaces, streets, and squares. To be sure, 'tis not Harrenhal, yet I do not think the city shall give us trouble in the coming months. Briefly put, My Lord, I raped one of the Three Whores."
Ser Elston snorted at the simple jest; Jaegaer and Harwin, too, could not restrain their smirks, yet the Velaryons remained murderously serious.
"You torched one of the Free Cities," Rhaenys reminded him. "Remind me, Cousin, did not your elder brother forbid you to meddle beyond the Stepstones?"
"The destruction of Myr will result in colossal losses to trade!" the Admiral supported his wife. "There were goods in the port bought or sold by our merchants!"
"By your merchants, My Lord. You remind me strikingly of Lord Otto when matters turn to the trade affairs of your House. I recall he behaved exactly so at a session of the Small Council."
"You disobeyed the King and exceeded your authority!"
"I am still his Hand and his brother," Daemon cut him off with an icy voice. "I have every right to act in the King's name, especially when the matter concerns our other brother. By the by, Lord Corlys, since you have recalled authority, mayhaps you might remind us what right you had to begin a war because of which your future good-son now lies at death's door?"
The grinding of the Admiral's teeth was audible to all at the table. Princess Rhaenys placed a warning hand upon her husband's shoulder, and he leaned back against the chair—which scarce deserved the name of "campaign chair"—yet continued to drill the Hand with an angry glare.
"What follows?" asked the Queen Who Never Was. "Are Laenor and I to prepare for a raid on Tyrosh? Or straightway to Lys?"
"If Tyrosh, we might arrange a landing beneath the city walls," interjected a lively Ser Elston, grinning at once. "Provided, of course, anything remains of it after three dragons."
"Naught shall remain of it," grumbled Estermont. "If My Lord Prince wrought in Myr even a tithe of what happened here, then naught remains of the whorish walls. Consequently, the Tyroshi ones shall be of no use either."
"On the contrary," objected Jaegaer, and all eyes immediately converged upon him; he had already had occasion to speak his word at councils, and at least in this narrow circle, none deemed him an upstart windbag. "The inner walls of Tyrosh were laid by the Valyrians and fused in dragonfire, like the Black Walls of Volantis, though they are not so great, as I have heard. The Tyroshi call them the Black Boundary. If there is anything in this world that dragons cannot destroy, 'tis that."
"We need not destroy this Boundary, Ser," remarked the Princess. "It will suffice to burn its upper tier—surely that is of wood?"
Jaegaer shook his head incredulously, expressing his doubt that the Tyroshi were so foolish. In the Black Walls of Volantis, which none had stormed for a hundred years and more, there were secret arrow slits arranged within the thickness of the fused stone; surely it was the same in the Black Boundary.
"And what of Lys?" suggested Lord Tarth. "If we lead the fleet into the open sea, we shall disrupt communications between Lys and Dorne. Furthermore, as far as I recall, there are no serious fortifications in Lys."
Jaegaer remembered Lys very vaguely: he had spent more time there dead drunk than sober, and never crawled out of the brothels, so he had had no time for sightseeing. One ought to have asked Aegon or Dennis about such things, but the former now lay senseless in his tent, surrounded by Maesters fighting for his life, and the latter kept a ceaseless vigil at his bedside.
"We shall burn neither Lys nor Tyrosh," Daemon delivered his verdict, surprising all his retainers.
"Why?" Harwin dared to ask the question of interest to all.
The Prince sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose wearily. Evidently, he already regretted his excessive candor, but from their service in the City Watch, Jaegaer remembered that his cousin never left a matter unfinished, whatever it concerned: a whore in a brothel on the Street of Silk, a thief who had robbed a merchant on the Street of Flour, or a war council on the Stepstones.
"I had no time to speak of this," he said at last. "I wished to announce it at supper, to raise a cup to the Old Blood, but now... The Volantene Freehold has also declared war on the Triarchy."
At the mention of the old house, the former Volantene's heart beat faster. If the New Freehold had decided after all to exchange the scratching of quills and the clicking of abacuses for the ringing of swords and the wailing of horns, it meant the "Tigers" had returned to power. It meant Vogarro Vassar had lost the elections, and surely not just one, else he would have strangled himself rather than permit a war. Although, who knows: mayhaps he truly did strangle himself? Or was strangled? However, the difference was slight.
The next thought pleased Jaegaer even less. Vassar had been one of Mother's first clients, and a direct and constant client at that: the knight remembered how, at some fourteen years of age, he had gone to his mother to complain of his annoying younger brother, but the honorable gela was occupied with politics with the Triarch. Jaegaer, of course, already understood the meaning of the hot moans drifting from behind the heavy velvet curtain, but after that, he could not look his mother in the eye for several days. She, naturally, understood everything and in her direct manner told her embarrassed son:
"Remember this when you race your chariot in the arena against the sons of other Triarchs. That is how I win for you, your sister, and your brother the right to live within the Black Walls."
Vassar had made the runaway Princess a Triarch, but if he was now out of affairs, and the Freehold was ruled by "Tigers"... It meant Mother's position had become even more lamentable than on the day of his exile. At first, this thought pleased the former exile, and a vindictively satisfied warmth spread somewhere in his belly, but in the next instant, his soul grew heavy and anxious. The "Tigers" would not hesitate to rid themselves of a whore and an upstart, and there were a thousand ways to do it, and fourteen more besides.
"Our Sovereign commanded me to open negotiations with Volantis, and I managed to exchange a couple of letters with its rulers," Daemon continued meanwhile. "The Golden Triarch Reylor Velaros sends my elder brother greetings and other diplomatic nonsense. What can our Volantene kinsman say of him?"
"He is a 'Tiger'," Jaegaer answered without thinking. "He became Silver Triarch some three times, and was such when Aegon guested with us." And he never favored Mother, the knight finished silently.
"He has risen in rank, then," concluded the cousin.
"The 'Elephants' usually did not admit 'Tigers' to the seat of the First Triarch. He must have managed to conspire with one of the 'Elephant' factions..."
"And what does this mean for the Seven Kingdoms?" inquired Lord Tarth.
"The Freehold wishes to settle scores with the Three Daughters for the last war. Did Velaros write of this, Cousin?"
"Almost," nodded Daemon. "I proposed he bite off his own piece of the Realm of the Three Whores, and he did not refuse. The Volantene Freehold will dispatch its fleet to Lys and will most likely seize it by year's end. Its army has already marched from Volon Therys and tramples Myrish fields. The Magisters, those who survived, of course, must decide which of their former masters is dearer to them. Then we moved to the discussion of duty-free passage for Volantene vessels through the Stepstones..."
"And there is the answer," chuckled Jaegaer. "The 'Elephants', as ever, want gold. They need Velaros to restore order in the Narrow Sea."
"I hope you had the wits not to agree?" the Sea Snake inquired dryly.
"I agreed to their future conquests, but limited the duty-free passage to a term of three years, and for the following eleven years proposed to set a fee of fourteen honors and seven helions per vessel."
Velaryon snorted in displeasure, and Lord Estermont grimaced:
"A laughable sum."
"Not if the ships are many," objected Daemon. "Furthermore, duties for Westerosi merchants in Volantene ports shall be lowered for the same term, and the New Freehold recognizes the Stepstones as the demesne of the Targaryens."
Silence hung in the tent once more. All peered into the map of the Stepstones and the northern part of the Summer Sea spread upon the table, and if Velaryon, Tarth, and Estermont were surely estimating possible profits, Jaegaer pondered the fate of the Essosi lands. Free Lys lay at a sufficient distance from the Orange Shore controlled by Volantis, so Velaros would have to keep a sizable garrison on the archipelago. Volantene power on the islands had been overthrown once before, albeit with the help of well-wishers, so the New Freehold ought to show prudence to prevent a repetition of that history.
"And when did Volantis dispatch its army?" inquired Lord Velaryon.
"A couple of weeks past," the cousin shrugged. "Now they should be occupied with seizing small towns and holdfasts. The ships will put to sea in ten days at the latest."
"A fleet cannot be prepared for a serious campaign in such time."
"That means they began to prepare beforehand," Lord Tarth noted reasonably. "But, since Lys is already given to Volantis, why not strike at Tyrosh? If dragonfire will not take this Black Boundary, then it will surely suffice for the suburbs and the fleet, and we shall take the island under blockade."
Daemon smiled promisingly; this expression was well familiar to Jaegaer—with such a face, the cousin would set forth on a raid into Flea Bottom or the port to scrape all the rot out of the capital.
"It is pleasing to know I was not mistaken in you, My Lord—you have arrived at the same decision as I. However, before we attend to Tyrosh, we must eliminate another threat. Martell armies already stand upon the Boneway and the Prince's Pass. I do not think the Stormlands and the Reach require an unpleasant surprise in the form of Dornish banners beneath their castle walls."
"Absolutely not needed, my Prince," nodded Estermont; it seemed his sister (or cousin? or aunt?) was wed to one of the marcher lords.
"In that case, it is worth sending a raven to the Marches," remarked Elston Tully, who had been silent until then. "The sooner they occupy the passes and paths, the better."
"The passes and paths are surely already in the hands of the Dornish, and to retake them is far harder than fords, bridges, and crossings," Tarth reasoned with the riverman. The heir to Riverrun proved smarter than he seemed to Jaegaer and let the barb pass unheeded.
"We could summon the Lannisters and their host," suggested Harwin after a pause.
"Too long," Daemon shook his head. "A raven will require no less than a week to fly to the Rock, and the Gods alone know how long Lord Tymond will take to gather."
"Meleys and I shall be there by the close of the third day," offered Rhaenys. "We have the swiftest wings."
"A difference of half a week will not help us nor save the marchers. Where is the map of Dorne?"
Usually, a Maester answered for maps and all manner of papers in Westeros, but at Daemon's councils, this duty was performed by Aegon, who fished the necessary scroll from the pile in good time. Now the youngest of the cousins fought for his life, and his elder brother rummaged through his paper heap, growing more and more irritated by the fruitless search. Jaegaer exchanged glances with Harwin, intending to offer his help to his friend-Hand and draw his possible wrath upon himself, but scarce had he opened his mouth when the Prince issued a triumphant:
"At last!"
The map of the southern extremity of Westeros covered the map of the Narrow and Summer Seas. The Maester had approached its creation creatively: amidst the scattering of small dots denoting sandy deserts, here and there snakes, scorpions, skulls, and bones peered out, that none might doubt the deadliness of these lands. Amidst them, rivers and oases were marked with blue lines and dots, though surely far from all; one of the rivers was labeled "Greenblood," and that no doubts might remain, the cartographer had traced it in green ink. Castles, towns, and villages were denoted by black dots; each castle was labeled, and a colorful roundel of its coat of arms was drawn beside it. A black dotted line denoted the borders of a lord's domains, and a pale black straight line connected the vassal's castle with the castle of his liege, such that all of them converged at Sunspear.
The title of the map, diligently written in an intricate hand with a great number of flourishes, read: "A True Depiction of the Principality of Dorne and the contiguous domains of the lords of the Seven Kingdoms, as well as other nearby lands and waters, as they were by the 3rd year of the rule of Prince Nymor Martell, the fourth of his name, from the Burning of the Ships by the 794th, and from Aegon's Conquest by the 101st. Executed by Maester Aron of Sunspear by order of the Prince."
The council, in a unanimous impulse, leaned over the table and in tense silence began to study Dorne as if for the first time. Jaegaer knew of it mainly from his mother: that the last Rhoynar ruled there, that their ancestor the Conqueror had tried to subdue them and lost, that one of his sister-wives had fallen there. The knowledge of the majority of his old friends from behind the Black Walls was limited only to the first fact.
"If we cannot occupy the passes ourselves," Ser Elston began to reason, "then we might try to block them from our side of the border, to prevent the Dornish from descending from the mountains."
"The marchers have been doing this since time immemorial," Rhaenys supported him. "Their forces should suffice for containment."
"Aye, if only the Vyls, Yronwoods, and Manwoodys stand on the passes," objected Estermont. "But if Qoren has not merely ordered his vassals to call the banners, but sent his own men to them, then the Dondarrions will have a hard time of it."
"And their neighbors have already sent their troops with us," put in Tarth.
"Boremund will not leave his vassals to the whims of fate."
"Your uncle has long ceased to be young, my Princess."
"Speaking frankly, he has failed greatly..."
"My uncle has a son and heir."
The two stormlanders exchanged glances, and then Tarth spoke cautiously:
"With all respect, my Princess... Ser Borros inspires no hope..."
"Borros is a sluggard," Daemon stamped harshly. "He would set forth to the Marches only to hunt the stag from his sigil. If the Baratheons do send someone, then with such a commander they will shit themselves in the first battle."
"We might try to use the rivers," suggested Tully after a pause, running his finger along the green ribbon dividing the deserts of Dorne almost in two. "They are few, but they lead deep into the continent. We could build longships, like those that ply the Trident and the Blackwater, and send troops upon them."
The Lord Admiral only snorted contemptuously:
"Do you wish to splash about in puddles?"
"A useless endeavor," Estermont seconded him.
"The Skyreach is too full of rapids, as is the Vyl," continued Velaryon. "The Torrentine is too far, and moreover, the current there corresponds to the river's name. I am not ready to vouch for a ship that enters the Brimstone—the crew and landing party will die of the fumes before they reach Hellholt."
"In any case, there remains the Greenblood."
"At the mouth of which stand Lemonwood and Planky Town. And one must still pass Sunspear..."
"It turns out Westerosi sailors are not so brave as they say, if they fear coastal fortresses," Elston threw out irritably.
The bull-necked Admiral had already opened his mouth to shorten the insolent riverman, but Daemon interrupted the brewing quarrel.
"I have heard you. What say the rest?" having said this, he looked expressively at Jaegaer and Harwin, who had been silent until then.
The heir to the Strongs wrinkled his forehead tensely and plucked at the stubble above his lip—sometimes it seemed to the former Volantene that his friend could simply not decide whether to grow a beard or not.
"What of dragonfire? Surely there are no impenetrable walls there?"
"Nay," agreed the Prince. "But we shall achieve nothing with dragons alone. Furthermore, we can currently count only on Caraxes and Meleys."
"And Seasmoke?"
"He might burn their fields, but that, you must agree, is too little. We need something more effective."
"For something more effective, we need more men," Corlys grimaced. "We cannot plan an offensive in Dorne and hold the Stepstones simultaneously. Calling the banners of the Tyrells and Lannisters will take too much time."
Banners, vassals, a sequence of homages and oaths from simple knight to king or prince. For Jaegaer, this still remained a strange novelty, which the foreigner accepted as a given but to which he was not yet fully accustomed. In the capital, all was simpler, since the city belonged to Cousin Viserys, and Jaegaer was the King's man, but beyond the limits of his domain, all was far more complex.
He tapped his finger thoughtfully on the map and, without wishing to, landed on one of the black straight lines denoting the subordination of one Dornish landowner to another. In the Volantene Freehold, there would be no difference between them—they would all be considered citizens and have the right to vote, but in Westeros, it was entirely different: someone was more important than the rest. This difference was also plotted on the map: one patch of land exceeded another in size, and more connecting lines stretched to some than to their neighbors.
"Hardly can the principles of Volantene politics be applied to Westeros," said the bastard knight. "But if we have... I mean to say that behind the Black Walls it is customary... If one cannot strike at someone directly, one must seek someone important in his entourage and strike at him. Set him up or something of that spirit."
"We speak of that very thing, Ser," grimaced the Sea Snake. "The vassals of the Martells, the Stony Dornishmen, occupy positions too good to strike at them. As for the rest..."
"Let my cousin finish, My Lord," Daemon cut him off.
Jaegaer nodded gratefully.
"If it is impossible to strike at the entourage, then one should act so that his supporters turn away from your opponent. Were we speaking of the Old Blood, I would propose spreading a rumor that he wishes to free all his slaves. That is nonsense and absurd, of course, but the undermining of traditions is not forgiven within the Black Walls, even if it be but rumors."
"Surely not all Dornishmen are content with Qoren," remarked Harwin.
"He wed his daughter to Drazenko Rogare," said Rhaenys. "And a daughter not yet flowered at that. Prisoners say the Prince's court is full of Lyseni, and old courtiers grumble that Dorne is on the threshold of a new migration and wait for the Essosi to begin burning their ships like Nymeria."
At that moment Jaegaer, sitting opposite his cousin, noticed a satisfied smirk spreading across his face, boding nothing good for his enemies. Following his gaze, the knight realized it was riveted to the largest knot of black lines, aside from Sunspear; he divined the Hand's design a few moments before the Prince tapped his pointing finger on a castle on the western shore of the Sea of Dorne.
"Yronwood," proclaimed Daemon.
"That is senseless," said Estermont in bewilderment. "I have been there: the port is small, the town there is foul, and 'tis ten miles from the shore to the castle. Useless to take it from the sea."
"I do not intend to take Yronwood from the sea, nor from the air, nor from the land."
"You wish to incite the Lord to rebellion?" Jaegaer clarified just in case.
"Precisely, Cousin," judging by the expression on his face, the Prince had surely already burned everyone and won. "The Yronwoods styled themselves High Kings of Dorne until the Rhoynar came. Yorick the Fifth warred longest of all against Nymeria and her cunt-licking husband."
"And lost in the end," the Princess cooled his ardor. "Nymeria exiled him to the Wall, if you have forgotten."
"I have not forgotten. And Lord Ormond, I think, remembers it too. The Yronwoods are of the Stony Dornishmen, and they are nigh Andals. First the Rhoynar deprived them of power, now the Lyseni scour them from court. And yet he can call a sizable army: the Jordaynes and Vyls are his bannermen, and there are landed knights, kin, and allies besides."
"Why would he change the place of first among Martell vassals for an adventure proposed by the enemy of his people with dubious prospects?" frowned Lord Velaryon.
"Why would you, My Lord, wish so much to seat your wife upon the Iron Throne?" Daemon inquired of the Admiral with a polite smile. "Or your son? Or to lay your daughter beneath the King or the Prince of Dragonstone?"
Velaryon was silent. One need not be a great politician to understand that Daemon was hurling not questions, but insults. At some moment Jaegaer thought the Sea Snake would either draw his new sword, gifted by the poor wretch Aegon, or lead his ships back to Driftmark.
"Calm yourself, Corlys," his wife said to him quietly but firmly. "Let us return to Yronwood. Why do you think, Cousin, that he will even read your letter? A raven can easily be shot down."
Daemon shook his head vaguely.
"We shall devise something. We shall direct a smuggler to the mouth of the Skyreach. We shall send a Septon under a seven-colored banner. Laenor will carry the message on Seasmoke. And you and I, Cousin, shall help him draw the right conclusion."
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