"I expect the two central towers to be ready in two moons, my prince," Qyburn said with palpable exhaustion. However, his workload had undoubtedly decreased when Dany became involved in the castle's construction. The girl was loved and respected by the people.
"That's a relief," said the prince. "Will they be habitable by then?" Even though they would only be towers, they had rooms that, although not the main ones for the lords, could serve temporarily.
"They will be," said the old man. "But they will not be completely isolated. The current mansions are safer for you." Jaehaerys nodded. It was easier to post guards at the manor than at a half-finished tower.
They continued chatting about the construction. Eight moons had passed since their arrival at Harrenhal, now transformed into ArgentStone. If the pace of construction continued, the castle would be complete in three years from then. The two central towers were two of the tallest, so they would take longer.
The outer walls will be expanded after the castle is completed. They were not a priority; the walls had been repaired, making Harrehal secure and capable of withstanding sieges.
So far, his brother had kept his word; materials and gold arrived steadily. And Lord Tully stopped sending letters inviting him to Riverrun. His older brother had not sent assassins.
Brandon would take another four moons to return, having left a month and a half ago. The journey from White Harbor to Astapor took up to eight or nine moons round-trip. With the compass he gave the Manderlys, they cut it down to less than seven moons, and as their confidence and skill increased, they could reduce it to six moons round trip. He gave him enough gold to bring back an army of at least eight thousand Unsullied. It would make the houses grind their teeth, but it would keep their swords away.
Dany had a necklace to detect malice and poison. Jaehaerys knew it worked on both. The test subjects he gave to Qyburn wanted to kill him, and he could feel the hot metal against his skin. He also made them resistant to poison. Too bad for them that Qyburn would take it upon himself to test the limits of magic against human ingenuity.
Jaehaerys remembered them crying and screaming when they tested the most horrible and deadly poisons the former maester could think of. But they did not die. They could suffer and wish for death, but they could not die. After a while, their bodies purified the poison, but the mental damage remained.
Jaehaerys had ordered Qyburn to design another tower, one larger than any of those that would make up the castle. Its function would be to serve as a vast, restricted laboratory. At least the upper floors belonging to Qyburn would not be accessible to those they did not trust.
The old man began to design it with enthusiasm, more than the prince had seen him work on the rest of the castle.
"How are the mines going?" He had put the iron and coal mines into operation. More than six hundred men worked in both, mainly in the coal mines, where two-thirds of those men were employed.
"About a hundred tons of coal are being extracted. The problem is transporting it to the castle," the master did not seem very interested. "As for iron, about three tons are being extracted. Once purified, there are about 1,400 kilograms left." The iron was not pure, and the impurities had to be removed.
"Order the creation of a reverberatory furnace and three blast furnaces. You remember, right?" It was a method he had previously discussed with him.
The blast furnaces were used to treat the iron ore, which was impure. They consisted of a tall tower, 33 to 49 feet high and 10 to 16 feet in diameter. Their walls were between 12 and 24 inches thick. There, the ore was mixed with coke, limestone, and iron. The result was pig iron, which still required further purification.
That's where the reverberatory furnace came in, which used indirect heat to heat the pig iron, allowing the gases in it and compounds such as sulfur, carbon, and phosphorus to escape. A slag formed, which consisted of non-metallic oxides. The pig iron never ended up liquid; they had to make sure it had a paste-like consistency, so that the slag would float because it was less dense and could be removed manually.
This method was not yet known in Westeros. The highest quality iron was not as good as the one he planned to create.
"Is there any immediate need for iron?" asked the old maester.
"There is. I want the workers' tools to be made of iron. New inhabitants have also arrived. I permitted them to cultivate land," he recalled encountering migrations after the king visited his castle. He now had about thirty thousand people throughout his land. It was not many, but considering that there had been fewer than ten thousand before, it was a considerable improvement.
"Give them iron?" the maester hesitated. But knowing Jaehaerys, he was sure he had some reasoning.
Although it was also possible that the prince wanted to improve their lives, he had a good heart. Qyburn hoped that the smallfolk would not destroy his trust in them.
"Yes. I also plan to create rails inside the mines, which will allow the minerals to be extracted more quickly. Metal is a necessity, not only for the army," Qyburn finally agreed.
"Then I will order the creation. I have the plans on my property," he said. Part of him was interested in metallurgy, but it was never his primary interest. If it were up to him, he would be opening up corpses and living people all day long, searching for the secrets hidden within the human body.
"Order the brickmakers to add the Kano rune to the bricks used in construction. There is a smithy near the north wall; let them build it there," it was best to use a space already assigned to the blacksmiths.
"It will be done, my prince, do you need anything else?" asked Qyburn.
"Tell me about Marwyn, the wizard." He had received letters from the man, who had expressed interest in visiting ArgentStone to discuss matters with him.
"He is a man who has devoted more time and effort than any other to the study of the mystic arts. I dare say he is more obsessed with them than you are," he said, speaking well of the archmaester. "Without as much success," he added at the end.
"I will allow him to visit the castle. The citadel also intends to send a maester. What do you think?"
"The grey rats hate the taste of magic," he warned.
"You may withdraw, Qyburn." He did not know how to refuse the maester sent by the citadel without becoming its enemy.
Although he was already at that point, his person was surrounded by mysticism and magic. The citadel had neglected Harrenhal. The maester died two weeks before he occupied the castle. It took them eight moons to replace him, which was strange. Even if they despised him, he was a Targaryen, so why did they spend so much time leaving him aside?
Now things were going smoothly; only war could delay the construction of his castle. But the kingdom seemed at peace. Daemon was off the map, and Viserys was subdued and isolated in Dragonstone. There was no basis for war.
Not within Westeros. But the shadow of Robert Baratheon still lingered in Essos. If he managed to get ships and send his people to Westeros, it would bring death, more so for the peasants. The lords would lock themselves in their castles; the Dothraki were not known for their siege capabilities, and the lords did not care about their people.
Jaehaerys began to think about how to maintain the loyalty of his people. Was it right to use magic to maintain loyalty? No.
But what was right would not keep him and Daenerys safe.
The dilemma lay in how to do it.
Inguz ᛝ. The rune represented family union, alliance, and commitment.
It would not be a rune that gave him mental control over his subjects. It would make them naturally more loyal. And it would give him the responsibility to protect them. But how could he apply it on a massive scale? He couldn't.
He could use it, not on the entire population, but on those he needed to keep secrets. The Inguz rune would keep them loyal. The Tyr, Thurisaz, and Hagalaz runes would bring punishment upon traitors. A disease would fall upon them, slowly killing them.
He would not use the last three runes on him, only the first, because he needed a commitment from both parties. If he betrayed his oath to protect them, there would be no consequences other than breaking the contract and having to start a new one.
'I need to experiment with the sap,' he thought, running his hand over his chest. The scar had healed. But he would prefer not to have to cut open his skin to inscribe runes on his body. It was unhygienic. The sap had a high adhesive capacity, and even if it disappeared, it remained magically marked where it was engraved.
'Perhaps I could use a prisoner and inscribe the poison purification runes on him,' he thought. With the population growing, banditry increased in his lands; there was no shortage of volunteers for the experiments.