It had been a strange and happening week for Rick. A lot more had happened in one week than in his entire life.
Somehow, and in a completely unexpected manner, Rick had become the informal leader of the city's ruling council. At the time when he had been pushed to the forefront for negotiations with Rhaenys Targaryen, the other council members had done so out of fear.
They were afraid of Rhaenys, of her dragons, that she would burn them the moment they tried to open their mouths. They were terrorised to take that role of placing their demands in front of her.
But Rick had been willing to take the risk. He knew that though it was risky, it was also rewarding. And even then, he knew that the risk was not as much as the other magisters had been considering.
He had observed and analysed what others had failed to do. If Rhaenys had truly been short tempered and impatient, she would have burned them along with the head priest himself.
But the very fact that she had granted them a full day and night spoke volumes. It meant that Rhaenys was willing to negotiate, willing to let them weigh their options. If she merely wanted blind surrender and subservience, she could have forced it then and there. She was very shrewd and cunning and understood that negotiating a surrender was better than forcing surrender.
And the negotiations had gone far better than Rick had expected.
True, not all of his ideas, suggestions, or terms had been accepted. The majority of them had been rejected or short changed from what he had actually asked. But she had been willing to hear every single one of them. She had been patient, remarkably so.
In fact, she had accepted a few of his suggestions and had even compromised on certain things she had originally intended. Most importantly, she had not snatched away their wealth. Not a single coin had been looted from their treasuries. Just that, they too now would be required to pay the taxes that they had not been paying for years as privileged magisters of the ruling council.
Because he had been pushed to the forefront of the negotiations, Rick had managed to earn a place in her eyes. The glorious reward he thought for. And he could feel that her grace admired his manners and advice. He became her first choice whenever she wanted to communicate something or implement a decision within the city of Qohor.
Although he held no formal position, informally he had become the chief adviser of Rhaenys Targaryen in the city. And he was proud of that fact. And that had made many other previous magisters jealous and envious of him.
And in just a single week, she had enacted many changes.
Some were minor changes, such as recruiting one thousand workers to maintain cleanliness in the city, and some extremely radical, such as the abolition of slavery and the gradual liberation of slaves over the coming months. For now though they were allowed to keep the slaves that they owned, buying and selling of any new slave had been made illegal and strict punishment had been enacted for breaking this decree.
The soft stance and gentle treatment that the queen had shown toward the council members had produced different effects among the magisters.
Barring her dragons, some had begun to see her grace as a weak and naive ruler. Someone who could be influenced easily. Someone who could be turned into a puppet.
They had already started making cunning plans and dreaming grand dreams. Rick knew of a couple of magisters who were already planning to bring Rhaenys under their control and turn her into a puppet ruler, someone they could influence and manipulate. To become the shadow king. A few had even begun dreaming of marrying their sons or grandsons to her and securing the throne for their bloodline. It was all laughable to Rick.
But Rick knew better. He understood far more clearly than the others that her grace was as ferocious and dangerous as her dragons were.
She was not weak, nor was she the frail and naive ruler they believed her to be. One wrong move, and their insides would be ripped from their bodies or their flesh burned to ash.
Others might have forgotten the glimpse she had shown them, but Rick had not. She had killed the head priest not in a fit of rage, but in a calculated and deliberate manner, to make an example of him. And if the magisters dared to cross the line, she would not hesitate to make an example of them as well.
Others might have forgotten that but he would never. Although he too wanted benefits for himself, he had decided to serve her with full loyalty. He was not going to be dishonest with her.
But there was one task she had handed to him that deserved special mention. Why?
Because Rick could not fully understand the purpose of that task. Or rather, he could guess its purpose. But he did not dare to think too deeply in that direction.
Her Grace, Rhaenys Targaryen, had ordered him to supply her with one ton of steel. It had taken him a few days, but he had managed to procure that much and have it delivered to one of the warehouses near the mansion where she was residing.
A Targaryen lady with dragons asking for steel, everything about it screamed Valyrian steel. Yet Rick did not dare think in that direction. After the Doom of Valyria, no one had been able to produce Valyrian steel, not even previous Targaryen dragonriders. How could she do it? Was that really possible?
And yet, there was a faint voice in his heart, one that kept pounding insistently with a single thought. Valyrian steel. He had worked with Valyrian steel a few times in his life. Was he going to handle it now on a large scale? As a blacksmith, working on Valyrian steel was the greatest privilege he could have.
And today, he had been summoned to her mansion. As he approached it, his heart thumped heavily in his chest, anticipation and unease mixing together as he wondered about the true purpose of this summons.
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