Chapter 98: The Red Waste
Wailing horses, crying infants—beneath the blazing sun, the old, the weak, and the sick of the Dothraki huddled together, forming an open-air encampment.
Overhead, the scorching sun beat down upon the barren Red Waste, baking the desolate land below. As far as the eye could see, the air itself seemed warped and trembling with heat.
The people scattered across the wasteland wore vacant expressions. Their cracked lips spoke silently of the camp's dire plight. In such a place, even the faintest breeze would have been a gift from the heavens.
Yet here, even the wind was hot.
"Your Grace, Jhogo is right. Doreah is beyond saving. You shouldn't waste what little water we have on her."
The hoarse, low voice belonged to a middle-aged man with a standing black bear tattooed across his chest. Sheltering beneath a crude awning, he rubbed his sore backside as he watched the bald young woman tilt a waterskin toward the lips of an unconscious girl resting across her knees.
"I won't abandon her." The bald woman licked her parched lips, her gaze stubbornly fixed on the maid in her arms. "A queen does not abandon any of her people."
To speak such words in the terror of the Red Waste was no small thing, yet the knight with the bear still shook his head.
"All this does is waste water."
"Maybe she'll live," the woman replied quietly.
The knight fell silent, as though unwilling to shatter such a naïve hope.
"Does this wasteland ever end?" the woman asked when he did not respond.
Though called a queen, she looked no more than a girl—perhaps not even that. Seated on the ground, her height was hard to judge, but her youthful features and the shifting emotions in her violet eyes made her appear heartbreakingly young.
She was, by any measure, a beautiful woman. Yet her gleaming bald head and the bare skin above her eyes, where brows should have been, lent her an eerie, almost unsettling appearance.
"It does, Your Grace," the knight replied at last, exhaustion etched across his face. "As long as we endure."
"Endure…" the girl murmured, drawing a deep breath. But when she saw the knight turn away in silence, the small spark of courage she had mustered flickered out.
He didn't truly know either, did he?
Lowering her gaze to her frail maid once more, the girl stared blankly, sorrow written across her face.
"Horse God, Many-Faced God, the Seven, R'hllor… any god at all," she whispered, clutching the maid's feverish hand. "Please save poor Doreah. She's suffered enough. Please—don't torment her anymore…"
As everyone had said, the maid who had followed her from the very beginning was dying of a terrible heat sickness.
Had this been any other problem, she could have led her khalasar forward herself. Though small and weak, her people would still have fought with all they had.
But against illness, even a queen was powerless.
Just like when her husband had died not long ago…
Lost in grief, she suddenly felt a cool breeze brush across her face. The unexpected chill made her shudder as the oppressive heaviness in her chest eased, if only a little.
But the breeze lasted no more than a blink before vanishing.
In its place came the Red Waste's familiar, suffocating heat, rising with the blazing sun as if determined to roast them alive.
The fleeting coolness was gone. Facing reality once more, the girl let out a regretful sigh—then froze.
Something felt wrong.
She turned sharply—
And there, before her, stood someone.
A half-transparent figure, faintly glowing with soft golden light—so subtle beneath the sun that it was almost unnoticeable.
"You…"
The bald girl couldn't help but gape.
The figure's appearance was strange—under normal circumstances, she should have cried out at once. Yet for some reason, this "person" radiated an intense sense of holiness, enough to calm the mind and ease the heart. So instead of screaming, she simply stared at the softly glowing, semi-transparent figure, confusion filling her eyes.
The figure paid her no attention after appearing. Instead, he glanced around the surroundings, then lifted his gaze toward the sky.
Under the girl's wary and puzzled stare, he fell silent for a moment before raising the staff in his hand.
She thought it was some kind of attack and opened her mouth to cry for help—but the sound died in her throat.
The staff did not strike her. It swept over her head instead, scattering shimmering white motes of light into the air.
As the white radiance brushed past her forehead, a cool, soothing sensation followed. Her eyes widened in astonishment.
Only then did she realize—the light was not meant for her, but for the girl lying unconscious across her knees.
As the glow settled, the maid's tightly drawn features slowly relaxed. The blood blisters on her lips and cheeks visibly shrank and faded.
The bald queen's eyes widened in disbelief.
Who is he?
Is he one of the gods above?
Did the gods hear my prayer just now?
The thought struck her like lightning. She lifted her head toward the glowing figure and asked eagerly,
"Please—what should I do?"
The question was vague, almost incoherent. Yet she believed that if this truly was a god, he would understand.
There was no answer.
Instead, the golden, indistinct figure frowned slightly. Then he raised the staff again and gently tapped it against her forehead.
The phantom touch sent a cool sensation through her mind, accompanied by a faint, resonant voice.
"If you turn back, everything will be lost."
The words echoed from deep within her heart.
During these past days, whenever she felt close to collapsing, that very sentence would surface in her thoughts—like self-encouragement, or as if someone unseen were constantly urging her onward.
Before, it had felt like nothing more than forced resolve.
Now, it carried meaning.
She didn't know whether the voice came from her own heart or from the being before her, but the message made something clear to her at last.
She wanted to ask more—
—but suddenly, a young, shrill cry rang out from nearby.
The sound itself meant little. Yet the moment it echoed, the hazy figure before her ignited in golden flames, his form beginning to dissolve from the feet upward, as though preparing to depart.
Alarmed, she sprang to her feet and called out desperately,
"My name is Daenerys—Daenerys Targaryen! Please, bless me!"
There was no response.
The golden flames burned out completely. The world returned to how it had been—scorching sun, distorted air, relentless heat.
As though nothing had happened at all.
And yet, the lingering coolness on her forehead left her mind clear and lucid. The confusion that had weighed on her thoughts vanished. She bit her lip and turned to face the people rushing toward her after hearing the commotion.
"Yes," she said firmly.
"If I turn back, everything will truly be over."
---
In the blink of an eye,
the barren red wasteland transformed into the comparatively cramped bedroom of Winterfell.
Charles lay half-reclined on the bed, leaning against the warm stone wall. The heat seeping through it was comforting.
But he paid no attention to his surroundings.
His mind was still replaying what he had just witnessed.
That endless red wasteland—there were no followers of the Seven there, not even signs of civilization.
By all logic, the power of the Seven should have been severely weakened in such a place. And yet, at that bald woman's prayer, it had erupted with astonishing force.
She is special, Charles thought.
Special to this world.
Otherwise, it made no sense—why a mere murmured plea could reach him, or why it could unleash such power.
And that sound…
"That was no ordinary beast."
A possibility took shape in his mind.
"That girl—was she the Dragon Mother? And that cry… was it a dragon?"
He didn't remember the details of the story clearly, but the image of a woman and a dragon together lingered faintly in his memory.
The Dragon Mother he recalled didn't seem that young—but television and reality rarely matched perfectly. After all, even Cersei had looked nothing like a middle-aged woman when he first saw her.
"If it truly was a dragon… could it be a manifestation of this world's 'truth'?"
"And if so—how does one touch that truth? With hands? With spirit? Or…"
"…by killing it?"
Charles pondered in silence.
He had sensed something strange about that prayer even before answering it, but he had gone in too hastily. When that beast's peculiar roar sounded, he hadn't been able to linger even a moment longer.
That regret lingered.
"No matter what, I need to make contact with that bald woman again."
The best way would be to go find her—but he had no idea where that red wasteland actually was.
And while dragons were important, the Others were no less so. If he chased after dragons now, wouldn't that be ignoring a closer threat?
At the very least, he still had the entire North as his foundation.
"Then… draw her here?"
If his memory was correct, that woman's ultimate goal was to return to Westeros.
As he thought it through, the plan gradually solidified.
"But the prerequisite is that she must pray to me again."
Charles felt confident about that. Anyone who witnessed a miracle would pray a second time.
After all—this was a divine sign.
That bald woman would be no exception.
…
By the way, why is it always bald women?
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