"Your move will throw the entire Essos into an uproar," Melisandre remarked, bringing Jon out of his thoughts about the warlocks and Daenerys. "Around 50,000 men moving by land and sea. This is an unprecedented event."
"It would appear to many as if you are declaring war on the entire Essos," she added.
"Everything that will happen in the future is going to be unprecedented," Jon replied. "And are not we declaring war on the entire Essos."
His eyes remained fixed on the departing ships. They were nothing more than dots in the vast sea.
"When are you going to announce the cities that will be targeted and ask for their surrender?" she questioned. "I am sure that none of the cities are going to surrender unless they see a blood bath."
"Let the men reach close to their destination first," he said. "And yes. They will not surrender. And they will surely witness a bloodbath."
"It will take a little more than a couple of months for the army to reach their destination," she stated, as a matter of fact.
"It will," Jon replied. "But before that we will have a Dothraki khalasar and an army of sellswords at our gates."
"Yes," Melisandre agreed.
As someone almost at the top of the hierarchy, she was well aware of the little ploy the magisters of a few cities had been plotting. Now that his army was on the move, the city was not as well defended as it had been previously, and it seemed the best opportunity for them to execute their plot.
"Volantis," Jon asked, finally turning to face Melisandre. "I trust that your plan to take over Volantis will work."
Melisandre nodded.
"The Red Temple is the most powerful institution in Volantis. Our roots run unimaginably deep. Our influence in the city is very powerful and we have most of the ruling elites in our pocket. The day you decide, Volantis shall be yours."
"Apart from them, the poor, the slaves, and the common people are extremely grateful to the Red Temple because of the charity we do. And I doubt they will have any problem accepting Lord Aeos, the Breaker of Chains and Bringer of Prosperity, as their monarch. And with the Red Temple standing behind you, there would be no obstruction."
"You will only need a small token force of two to four thousand men to take over Volantis," she added.
Jon nodded, satisfied. Taking in Melisandre had its own benefits. She was delivering Volantis, one of the most powerful cities in Essos, basically on a platter for him.
"Why do you not take over Volantis first?" she questioned. She had wanted him to march straight to Volantis, but Jon had other plans.
"Not now," he said, shaking his head, and did not elaborate further.
He knew that the time of the canon was approaching. He was not certain how his presence might have changed a few things. In Essos, the timeline was of no use now. But Jon had not done anything in Westeros, and in all probability, things there should unfold as they were meant to.
Jon wanted to be as close to Westeros as possible before the timeline began. His immediate focus, for now, was to establish his stronghold on the eastern shore of the Narrow Sea.
And while taking Volantis required no effort, he would need to set up a sound administrative setup in the city. And he did not have much time to remain so far away from the narrow sea. Melisandre did not press the issue. Sooner or later, Volantis was to come under the reign of Lord Aeos.
.
.
.
(Illyrio's POV)
A group of luxurious tents had been set up in the middle of nowhere. In the largest tent, which stood at the centre of the camp, a small gathering of around two dozen people had assembled and I was one of them.
It had been around eleven days since Lord Aeos' army had marched. And though there was still no news of which city would be targeted first, the direction in which the army was advancing had given everyone a vague idea of their destination. They were not marching north towards ther smaller settlements or northwest towards Braavos.
They were marching westwards. And five cities stood as the most probable targets. My own city, Pentos; Myr; Tyrosh; Lys; and Volantis.
It had been months since Lord Aeos had recruited such a massive army under his command. We had known of its numbers for months, and though we had been shocked, we had not truly grasped the gravity of it. Or perhaps we had understood, but had been too terrified to face the truth.
But now that the army was on the move, the realization struck us. Fifty thousand men. If we exclude Volantis, the combined strength of our four cities barely amounted to fifty thousand. And of those, many were mercenaries. The majority were private soldiers belonging to various magisters, not the city's own standing army.
Yet, we had no choice now but to face the truth.
And we had gathered here to face that truth.
This plot had been brewing for months. I had even warned Lord Aeos about it. The scheme by a few magisters to send Dothraki tribes and sellswords against his three cities. At that time, I had not been a participant in the plot. I had merely been observing it. I had hoped that by giving him information about such a plan, I would earn his favour. But nothing of the sort had happened.
But now that I and many of the other magisters were in the same boat, we had no choice but jump in this plot.
He had acted nonchalant and had completely ignored me. I had thought then that his indifference was simply an act, a way to avoid being indebted to me. But it seems that I was wrong.
He truly seemed to have ignored my advice. He had deployed almost all of his army, leaving behind only around twelve thousand men to defend his cities. That meant roughly four thousand per city.
I do not know why he would make such a reckless move. To expose one's stronghold in the greed for more territory is not a wise decision and certainly not something you would expect from a man of his calibre. Yet here we were.
Was Lord Aeos really so ignorant that his own empire could be struck before he captured another city? Or had power already blinded him? It was difficult to understand.
The atmosphere in the room was tense and it was not hard to understand the reason. And then it came. A loud sound of a bell being rang. It was the official announcement of the start of this meeting.
#
#
#
[Add the book to your collection. Send it some power stones. Leave a rating and a review.]
[Access advanced chapter on P@treon. Replace @ with a. One additional advanced chapter each week on P@treon. ]
[email protected]/imaginarywriter