Prince Aegon Targaryen
The death of the Ibbenese fleet did not affect the campaign immediately. Before the surviving barrel-like ships managed to paddle to Lorathi harbors, scouts reported that Norvoshi had decided to make a sortie into Braavosi territory after all. A large detachment obviously intended to ravage small towns of craftsmen and miners, where most blanks for the most diverse goods and genuine masterpieces subsequently sold in the markets of the Titan's City were born. Ternesio Zalin, naturally, had to prevent this and, scarce had the storm subsided, drove his army to the border.
Aegon, using the privilege of the conqueror of the Ibbenese and dragonrider, allowed himself to let the mercenaries go ahead, and preferred to sleep off: in the end, Norvoshi were not mentioned in the agreement with Ortheris in any way. However, the next day he ordered the half hundred of Celtigar's men remaining with him to strike the tent and catch up with the Braavosi; the Prince himself, saddling Vermithor, set off in search of the worshipers of divine axes who had lost their fear.
Hunting them did not take much time: they, hiding not a whit, walked along the very tract. The Bronze Fury fell upon them from heavy leaden clouds with furious, fiery rain; instantly scattered formations of shaven-headed and bearded warriors could offer no resistance—having come to Braavosi lands only for easy profit, they possessed only light siege weapons, on which the dragon's first blow fell.
Deprived of fighting spirit, the crowd of Norvoshi broke up into small detachments and scattered along the southern spurs of the Braavosi hills. In this form, they were no better than robbers, but still represented a threat to the lands of Braavos; Aegon could not leave them alone to plunder the surroundings, therefore tried on the role of a shepherd: day after day Vermithor appeared now here, now there, turning luckless warriors to flight with his mere appearance, forcing them to unite and retreat further north along the road. Where emboldened Norvoshi guessed to organize some semblance of resistance, dragonfire entered the business. Little by little, the Prince and dragon drove the burnt, frozen, and half-starved army straight onto the even ranks of Zalin's army.
The end of the horde was rather inglorious: Norvoshi, praying to their bearded bear god, rushed into a suicidal attack and fell under Braavosi arrows, bolts, and stones. From the testimonies of the few who ended up captive, the Braavosi found out that the attackers were heretics broken away from the Norvoshi Temple and officially had nothing in common with the masters of the city.
"How convenient," marveled Zalin at the council, flashing gold teeth in the candlelight. "Norvoshi dumped their schismatics on us and surely received money for this from Lorath. A beautiful scheme!"
"Truly Essosi," remarked Aegon then, sipping heated red wine. Braavosi added a mixture of ground pepper, cloves, and nuts to the drink—it turned out vigorous, but tasty and hot. "Only in the Free Cities can one fearlessly fail to fulfill an obligation and receive money for it."
The Prince's remark was then prudently let pass ears. Surviving officers of the heretic army were sent to Norvos—there remained no doubt that bearded priests would disown the "unauthorized" actions of apostates and execute them for show. News that the Sealord hired a dragon for the war had surely already reached the banks of the Noyne. Now the matter was small: it remained to take Lorath itself by storm.
. . . . .
The siege of Lorath began with ensuring Braavos's superiority at sea. Considerably battered by storms and previous defeats, the fleet under crimson sails included five galleons, fifteen carracks, two dozen dromonds accompanied by a hundred cogs, longships, and an even greater number of barks, but Braavosi admirals preferred to play it safe anyway and, before going to sea themselves, sent Aegon ahead astride Vermithor.
The harbor of Lorath represented a deep wedge-shaped bay blocked by an artificial embankment-breakwater; according to legends, it was of the same age as the famous Mazes, and those very mysterious Mazemakers erected it. Hairy men who came after them, and following them Andals, not shy in the slightest, used the advantages of buildings hewn right into the rock, being either temples, or palaces, or barns. However, neither Mazes erected in multitude on the Lorathi archipelago, nor other mysterious buildings, nor convenient and equipped harbors saved them from the wrath of dragonlords. They did not save them from the current master of the Bronze Fury either.
Aegon was assigned a not too trivial task: burn Lorathi ships without cluttering the harbor itself too much with their remains—Braavosi wanted to land in the city with all conveniences. On a clear early morning rare for the beginning of winter, Vermithor flew from the east, almost indistinguishable in the rays of the rising sun; when his flame first touched the water surface, instantly turning it into steam, Lorathi who missed the enemy at first stared bewilderedly into the fog taken from nowhere, and only when a stream of flame burst from it began to deploy their scorpions.
By irony of fate, the lighthouse at the entrance to the bay took the first fiery blow—its funeral pyre burned brightly and quickly thanks to stocks of blubber, which seemed to be used by everyone and everywhere in the Shivering Sea. Wooden walls and houses on the stone embankment perished next. Vermithor banked, going for a new pass, and this gave the defenders of the city the time so necessary to them; when the dragon descended again, several dozen scorpion bolts and many stones and arrows flew to meet him. Most of them flew too low, others missed, and those that reached the target weakened so much that they only scratched the lizard's scales.
Aegon bent down to the saddle handles, as he did in the battle with the Ibbenese, and allowed the Bronze Fury to fall upon the nearest watchtower like a fiery tornado. Wood instantly flared up, and stone glowed red-hot in tongues of dragonfire; Aegon heard guards screaming, melting into their own armor; some, maddened by pain, threw themselves from the walls, but some in a suicidal attack rushed to Vermithor to finally become a pile of melted metal in another fiery stream. An inner voice with the hungry aspiration of a predator choking on saliva remarked that the Prince felt no pity for burning people at all, though they look more like him than hairy Ibbenese. Aegon readily agreed with him: it is hard to be tormented by pangs of conscience when they try to kill you; well, and that they fail is not their fault—try defeating a dragon!
Of course, the gods could not have chosen a more fitting moment for a lesson in vigilance, circumspection, and caution. They tormented a single tower too long, which allowed its neighbors to deploy, load their weapons, aim, and fire a volley. No fewer than five harpoons launched by scorpions from close range managed to reach Vermithor after all, piercing his scales. The dragon roared—as Aegon managed to understand, more from surprise that someone could wound him than from pain—and turned all his attention to the insolent ones. His flame, fed by anger, seemed much hotter than in previous times, and the tower flared up in a fiery column; but even this seemed little to the dragon; with an angry roar from which even stone walls of the Mazes trembled, he rushed like a battering ram at the tower, exposing a wide chest covered with strong horn plates to shots. Aegon barely managed to press himself into the saddle when burning splinters, red-hot stone crumbs, and what used to be people whistled around him. Vermithor trampled on the wreckage, shook himself, breaking shafts of harpoons, and rose into the safe sky again.
Curbing the enraged Bronze Fury did not succeed at once. The Prince tried mentally reaching for his consciousness, clinging to that invisible thread binding the giant flying lizard and the clubfooted man, but catching alien mental images did not work—they revolved around pain, revenge, and coming destruction. Sharply jerking the reins toward himself, Aegon managed to draw Vermithor's attention to himself:
"Calm down., Calm down., Vermitor!—thought Aegon to the dragon. —I am within you. Stand ... . I know the victory"
Persuasions worked, the lizard ceased rushing about the heavens and submitted to the rider's will. Finding a common wave, dragon and man became as if one in two bodies: this was not at all like Aegon remembered from his First Dream when he was in the body (or head?) of Caraxes—there was no impression of a detached observer controlling nothing; on the contrary, Aegon felt when Vermithor wanted to turn, roar, or flap a wing, and Vermithor needed no commands to do what Aegon wanted from him.
They—together—laid a circle over the harbor, surveying the battlefield in a new way already. On ships mooring lines were cut, trying to leave the harbor become a trap in the blink of an eye; on remaining watchtowers scorpions and ballistae were deployed with shouts, trying to catch such a large but fast target in sights; in the city itself, judging by wails reaching them, panic grew.
"Qīzalbri se lōgra. (Fireworms and ships.)"
"Lōgra se qīzalbri, (Ships and fireworms,)" agreed the dragon with his rider and breathed a new stream of flame on the nearest galleon, immediately shifting his attention to its neighbor.
They wanted to burn all ships first so as not to catch them all over the archipelago later, but an enemy projectile intervened in the matter again very inopportunely. This turned out to be that very rare case, that very fatal exception to all rules called an accident. Lorathi were poor marksmen and hit before only because Vermithor exposed himself; Lorathi catapults were hardly better than Westerosi and certainly worse than Braavosi. However, a hefty stone launched by one of them by unfortunate chance at the very highest point of its flight managed to hit Vermithor in the chest.
. . . . .
The Free City of Lorath, whose ships sailed the Shivering Sea from White Harbor to Ibben and even distant Mossovy, fell in just a day. With the arrival of the Braavosi fleet, defenders seemed to lose all will to resist; had to tinker in suburbs, of course, where urban poor helped soldiers as they could, but in quarters of nobility and merchants the city watch quickly surrendered positions. Perhaps the triumvirate of Lorathi Princes was impressed by the number of soldiers the Sealord brought to their doorstep; perhaps they were convinced by the appearance of a dragon right over the palaces.
Vermithor managed to rise into the sky after all, but it was no longer his native element: if before flight was natural and easy, now every flap of wings was given to him with tangible difficulty. And yet the landing of the Bronze Fury on the main square of Lorath played its role—a white banner with the black head of the Titan with fiery eyes was raised over the city. However, the real battle was only just beginning; as mercenaries sharpened their swords before, so lawyers, diplomats, and accountants sharpened their quills; like sailors pouring pitch into barrels for flamethrowers, pettifoggers poured ink into their gold, silver, bronze, bone inkwells; before the battle itself officers of the Braavosi army issued their subordinates a cup of strong tincture for courage and strengthening of spirit—before the start of peace negotiations representatives of the Sealord of Braavos warmed their vocal cords with warm drink before hours-long disputes and took all antidotes at hand—for courage.
Under other circumstances, Aegon would only be glad to participate in peace negotiations, and from the position of a winner at that, but this was not his war, and not even a war of the Seven Kingdoms; he fulfilled his part of the deal, and he should have been paid for it. The only conversation about possible political consequences of the war occurred between the Prince and the Sealord a few days before departure to the Lorathi Bay. Tycho Ortheris invited Aegon to supper, at which seven courses were served—all as one in Westerosi style—and inquired as if by chance:
"How does it seem to you, Prince, how will the war end?"
"With victory?" answered Aegon question with question, gnawing a duck leg in honey sauce.
"Of course, but I speak not of that. We win. And what then?"
"It is your war, my Lord, and you will be the winners, so it is for you to decide. But permit me to remind you of one old proverb, in the Seven Kingdoms in different expressions they repeat it from the Wall to the Dornish Marches: before selling a bear's skin, one must first kill it."
Ortheris laughed politely and wagged a thick greasy finger:
"We say differently: before saying 'Yes', count how much you will get for it."
"In essence the same thing," shrugged the Prince. "Both versions speak of risks."
"Disagree. Your version truly warns of risks. A bear skin is highly valued, but its owner is a very serious opponent, and killing him is not so simple. Our proverb speaks of the necessity of competent calculation of possible profit."
"Same thing."
"And yet your version warns of death, and ours—of ringing coin," smiled the Sealord slyly. "Agree, it is perceived a little differently."
Aegon barely restrained himself not to roll his eyes. Truly, to outargue a Braavosi one must be born a Braavosi merchant.
"Remind me, how did we pass to belles-lettres and folk proverbs?"
"I asked a question, and you, I fear, did not understand it. Evidently, I had too high an opinion of my Andal," shook his head Ortheris with feigned sadness. "I rephrase: what will happen to Lorath?"
"What will we do with Lorath?"
The Prince carefully dabbed his lips with a brocade napkin, then slowly drank Arbor wine from a golden goblet, carefully thinking over the answer.
"When Ibbenese came to Lorath, they exterminated those remaining after the Mazemakers. When Andals came to Lorath, they exterminated and enslaved Ibbenese. When Valyrians came to Lorath, they burned the kingdom of Andals to the ground. Does it not seem strange to you, my Lord, that a place absorbing so much blood over so many centuries still attracts people?"
"No, Prince. The name of this strangeness is trade. Convenient harbor, tolerable land, safe distance from neighbors—what else does a small state need? Therefore no one managed to trample the coals of their hearths. It is convenient to live here, therefore people return to ashes, fan these coals, rebuild houses, and begin to live anew."
Aegon raised his glass:
"Then let us drink to doing without ashes and fanned coals this time. Let us break the vicious circle," in other words, the Seven Kingdoms did not wish Lorath destroyed to the ground, did not wish too significant strengthening of Braavos.
"To the broken circle," supported him the Sealord, accepting the terms of the game.
So now, when the war was over, Aegon could be sure of one thing: Lorath's independence would be preserved; of course, if Ortheris gave corresponding instructions to his representatives. However, now the Prince was much more worried not by the fate of a whole state being decided nearby, but the health of his dragon.
With great difficulty Vermithor was persuaded to rise into the air again and almost completely occupy the garden of one of the palaces in the center of the city; while the lizard broke trees, arranging himself a nesting place, Ser Bartimos's people took control of the estate—the mistress, a lean old maid with hair of unpleasant mouse color had to make room, but such is the lot of the defeated.
With the help of Dennis and several brave souls from "Crab's Claw" not afraid to crawl on the dragon, Aegon for the first time since the visit to Pentos unsaddled Vermithor. The Bronze Fury accepted relief from the burden, become more tangible after the wound, with gratitude, burying his snout in his rider's shoulder, nearly knocking him off his feet. This gesture, however, failed to lull Aegon's anxieties, he felt the dragon was in pain, and immediately set to examination.
A couple of hours later nine broken harpoons and five tips from scorpion bolts were extracted from Vermithor's hide: one pierced the leather crest on the neck, the second got stuck between the opposing finger of the hand and the wing bone, others—in different places on the belly and sides. However, none of these wounds was serious—Lorathi steel could not pierce thick dragon hide and jagged tips only got stuck in it; to extract some, Aegon had to pry and carefully remove adjacent scales. Vermithor endured the whole process of healing stoically: no one's tongue would turn to call the process of picking off scales pleasant, but small sensitive holes in his armor will heal in a couple of months—new scales will crawl out between old ones.
Far more seriously worried the Prince the stone that flew into the broad dragon chest. Outwardly no damage was visible, but then why did they nearly fall during the battle? Why did fire fly out of the dragon maw not in a powerful stream for a hundred-odd yards, from which stone melted, but in pitiful spits in which there was more smoke than flame? Why did Vermithor begin to fly poorly? Why, in the end, did Aegon's own chest constrict?
Aegon placed hands on the warm dragon flank and leaned his forehead against it. Vermithor purred, trying to calm his rider: as if to say, all is well, we survived worse; but this did not deceive the Prince. He heard wheezes that should not be, he felt the Bronze Fury's bravado was feigned, and under it he hides pain and his own fear. The latter became a great discovery—the dragon feared something. Death? This is natural for all living beings. His own impotence? Inability to fly? Inability to incinerate enemies? This looks more like fears of a sentient being.
Slowly moving along the dragon flank, Aegon finally found the place where alien-own pain was felt strongest. Fortunately, contrary to his fears, as if nothing was broken; hardly could the Prince explain his confidence, but for the integrity of ribs he could vouch with his head; however something was wrong with them, not as it should be. Contusion? Of course, there was a contusion, a boulder the size of a cart flew into his chest after all. But hardly does a simple contusion affect the ability to breathe fire; means everything is significantly more serious.
Aegon pulled away and thoughtfully looked into Vermithor's amber eyes. Living in the world for twenty-one years, he managed to study dragons perhaps better than anyone in Westeros and still knew lamentably little about their internal structure. If Viserys had not thrown a tantrum then and given him and Barth the opportunity to dissect Balerion... Perhaps now he would have an answer to the question what is wrong with his own dragon, and how to help him. All he was capable of now was ensuring him peace and proper care in the blind hope that the enduring dragon organism will recover itself with the help of rest and hearty dinners.
Vermithor roared briefly and sadly. Simply amazing, thought Aegon, how such a mighty and deadly creature can emit such plaintive sounds. The Prince smiled weakly and ruffled the deadly poor fellow on the snout.
"Drakari pykiros, tīkummo jemiros, (Dragon of fire,Leader of the flight,)" an ancient song poured from him of itself, calming and lulling not only the dragon but his rider too. "Yn lantyz bartossa saelot vāedis hen ñuhā elēnī... (The two heads sing [together?] from my voice…)"
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