The blue Sealord's Palace stood at the northernmost edge of Braavos.
Freygo boarded his own Smiling Ship and sailed across the entirety of Braavos.
He knew that Viserys would never agree to peace talks.
The so-called "compensation" was nothing more than a pretext.
Even if he received the compensation, Viserys would not withdraw his army.
Freygo therefore intended to use this opportunity to let every Braavosi see his sincerity.
Once the negotiations inevitably collapsed, they would surely stand with him and defend Braavos to the bitter end.
And Freygo's approach was proving effective.
The appearance of the Smiling Ship itself caused quite a stir.
Residents of the islands all gathered along the shores.
Eddard was also accompanying Freygo to the negotiations.
As long as Viserys withdrew his army, they could return to Westeros.
Robert had also given Eddard an extremely important task: make absolutely certain that Freygo did not secretly reach some agreement with Viserys and "sell" them out.
Eddard did not think that would happen.
That line, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself," had resonated deeply with him.
Of course, Eddard did not believe Viserys would simply leave after receiving the money either.
Ten million gold dragons was an outrageous demand.
There was certainly room for negotiation, but there was little point in negotiating over such a sum.
Through the cabin window, Eddard caught glimpses of the Braavosi outside.
He saw quite a few widows.
One red-haired woman briefly made him think of Catelyn.
She held a runny-nosed child by one hand and carried an infant wrapped tightly against her back.
At the Battle of Andalos, Viserys had captured at least forty thousand Braavosi soldiers.
Viserys had also informed the people of Braavos of this through his pamphlets.
He had declared that as long as they surrendered, all those soldiers would be allowed to return home.
Nothing could have been more persuasive.
And no one wanted the war to end more desperately than those poor women.
For a moment, Eddard felt deeply troubled.
If Braavos truly resisted Viserys to the bitter end, what would become of these people?
Everyone was experiencing a method of warfare they had never encountered before: psychological warfare.
"Your Grace! We don't want your money. We only want the war to end!"
Someone suddenly shouted from the crowd.
Freygo, who had been resting with his eyes closed inside the cabin, stiffened.
"Your Grace! My husband is still alive! We don't want to fight anymore!"
The voices outside continued without end.
Quairo glanced at Freygo and moved to draw the curtains across the windows.
"Don't."
Freygo stopped him.
"These commoners know nothing. They don't understand how terrifying the rule of the Dragonlord would be."
As an older ruler, Freygo was not easily shaken.
He suddenly turned toward Eddard.
"Lord Stark."
Eddard was surprised to hear Freygo speaking fluent Common Tongue.
"Do you see those two ships behind us?"
"Yes. They are carrying part of the compensation to be given to Viserys."
Eddard answered.
He had heard that Freygo had gone to great lengths to gather the money.
The Iron Bank's gold was not limitless.
It had already been strained when Viserys seized four and a half million gold dragons from it.
Before that, Littlefinger had also borrowed a considerable sum from the Iron Bank.
Then, when the allied army marched south to attack Gohor, Freygo had borrowed another enormous amount.
Although the Iron Bank's most valuable assets were certain forms of "real estate," there were no buyers to be found for them now.
Even the nobles of Westeros had contributed. The jewels decorating their armor and swords had been removed and collected.
Yet Freygo merely grinned smugly.
"There is nothing on those ships. I intend to use all that money to reward the army."
Hearing this, Eddard's eyes widened.
He turned around and looked at the ships again, noticing that their waterlines were unusually high above the surface.
In other words, the ships behind them were completely empty.
Freygo's plan was to display the empty ships to the common people of Braavos once they returned.
He could publicly declare that Viserys had taken the money but still refused to withdraw his army.
That would allow the people of Braavos to stand firmly behind him.
Even the nobles who opposed Freygo would have nothing left to say.
Eddard looked at Freygo, his heart shaken.
This was an extraordinarily clever move.
Viserys's use of pamphlets to communicate directly with the people of Braavos had certainly been influential.
But even so, seeing was believing.
Freygo was gambling with more than a decade of governing Braavos.
With this maneuver, most Braavosi would believe that Freygo had genuinely intended to negotiate peace.
The negotiations had failed only because Viserys was too greedy.
In his more than thirty years of life, Eddard had never witnessed such intricate deception between two sides.
'But what will it cost?'
Eddard subconsciously looked toward the commoners on either side of the ship, but soon pushed the thought aside.
This was destined to be a struggle in which one side would live and the other would die.
Once he returned to Westeros, he intended to persuade Robert to stop drowning himself in pleasure.
Before long, Quairo reminded Freygo that he could see Viserys's ships.
Eddard went onto the deck and looked toward the black-sailed flagship in the distance.
For some reason, he felt nervous as well.
There had once been a Blackfyre Rebellion in Targaryen history.
The Blackfyre in question had been a bastard son of Aegon IV.
In his bid to claim the succession to the Iron Throne, he had even established his own House Blackfyre and the Golden Company.
If not for R'hllor's interference, Viserys might already have been leading a vast army toward King's Landing.
That Blackfyre had been a formidable man in his own right.
And Viserys was even more powerful.
Gohor was certainly not something that could be compared to a mere Golden Company.
As the ships of both sides drew closer, Eddard saw a familiar young man standing at the bow of the black-sailed warship.
Black hair and grey eyes.
He looked almost exactly like Eddard himself had in his youth.
Looking more closely, there was even some resemblance to Eddard's elder brother, Brandon.
'Could that be Lyanna's child?'
Viserys had deliberately brought Aemon along for these negotiations.
He had simply assumed that there would certainly be Westerosi, perhaps even Northmen, among the people taking part in the negotiations.
Once they saw Aemon, perhaps they could be persuaded to change sides.
If Eddard himself had been sent, that would have been impossible.
But from the perspective of someone who knew how this story would unfold, it was simply an opportunity to watch a good show.
The ships of both sides finally drew alongside one another.
Viserys naturally could not simply have Balerion burn Freygo to death.
Killing Freygo would be easy enough.
The difficult part would be ruling Braavos afterward.
Soon, the two sides sat facing each other in an open-air meeting place that had been prepared in advance.
Aemon had been brought along merely as an attendant.
The person actually participating in the negotiations alongside Viserys was Clinton.
"Freygo, where is my compensation?"
Viserys spoke calmly, as though ten million gold dragons were nothing more than pocket change.
Freygo, however, broke into a wide grin.
"Viserys, it's only the two of us here. There's no need to put on an act. I won't give you a single iron coin."
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