City of Dragons

Chapter Two.

Dany brushed her fingers through the silver stubble that was all that was left of her hair, it had all been burnt away when she had stepped into the fire of her sun and stars pyre, the pyre which had brought her dragons into life at the cost of her son, her Khal and her love.

She had been using the pelt of the great white lion of the Dothraki Sea, the Hrakka, to cover her bald head. But in the heat of the Red Waste had made it almost unbearable to wear, though the thought of taking it off was almost as unbearable. It had been the last gift that her Sun and Stars had ever given to her, she would be as upset if something happened to it as if something were to happen to her silver.

But the heat had been unbearable when the sun had risen on the pale city once again so she had no choice but to take the skin off and hand it over to Irri, it felt strange for her Khalasar to see her like this, she didn't like it. She was a queen, a Khaleesi, when they looked at her though a part of her that sounded far too much like Viserys said that all they saw was a regular woman, not even that, a little girl pretending to be a queen.

No woman had ever lead a Khalasar, not once in the entire history of the Dothraki. She would never be safe so long as she lead them, when word reached the other khalasars on the Great Grass Sea then some would come after her, the kinder ones would drag her back to Vaes Dothrak so she could take her place among the crones of the Dosh Khaleen.

The ones who were not kind would kill her for daring to challenge the way that things had always been and the cruel Khals...

Her thoughts turned back to poor Eroeh, a dark haired and black eyed girl of the Lamb People of Lhazar who she had claimed as a slave in order to protect her from being taken by the members of Drogo's Khalasar, along with dozens of other women from the village that the Khalasar had burned and raided. It hadn't been enough to save her, the poor girl had still been raped when Drogo had fallen ill and fell from his horse and a dozen khals had been born that day.

And it was all because of another member of that village, the Godswife and Maegi Mirri Maz Dur, had tricked her into thinking that she would help her Sun and Stars after he had been wounded. She didn't blame her for hating him, if she had been a member of that village then she would want vengeance as well.

But she hadn't been, she had been Drogo's Khaleesi and the fire that had burned inside of her when she realised her betrayal, it burned brighter than any star. Any funeral pyre. She had killed her child, her babe while he had still been in her womb. All her hope had been wrapped up into their babe, her sweet Rhaego who had kicked as fiercely as a stallion while he grew inside of her.

He had been innocent of any wrong. His father's crimes hadn't been his.

But he would have been the Stallion who mounted the world, would burn cities to the ground and his horde would have trampled nations into dust. How many would he have killed? How many mothers would have to mourn their sons? How many would be taken into slavery? How many girls would be just like Eroeh, would her son's Khaleesi have been like her and been forced to take them as slaves to protect them or would she have turned a blind eye to all the suffering around her.

Had all that hurt and suffering been avoided by the death of her babe? Perhaps, but it hurt her to think of that. He had been hers, it had not been for Mirri Maz Dur to deal out her judgement on to him. She had murdered him just as much as she had murdered her Sun and Stars.

But had she? She had made a salve for the wound and Drogo had complained that it had burned his skin before he had ripped it off and he had the Eunuchs who knew the secrets of healing made him a soothing poultice. It was only after that his wound had worsened and he had weakened, at the time she had been so sure that it had been the godswife who had done it.

But Mirri had said that fire cleansed, and Dany knew the truth of that well enough. The eunuchs only ever used fire to clean out wounds, they had even insisted on keeping the salve that the Maegi had made for him on but her Sun and Stars had refused them and only after that had he truly began to weaken.

It was the Stallion that would mount the world that Mirri Maz Dur had wanted to stop, not Drogo. Dany doubted that Mirri did not want revenge but after Dany had taken her to protect her she had not once looked at Drogo aside from when she had been healing him. Drogo was simply something in the way of her goal, Drogo would never have let anyone harm her or their son.

She had tried to convince herself every night that what she had done had been right, it was justice. She had taken her babe's life, regardless of anything else. She had tricked her into thinking that she could save Drogo and all that it would take would be a horse. It had cost her so much more than that and in the end the exchange had not at all been worth it.

She had paid for life and it was life that she had bought, but life wasn't enough. Drogo breathed and eat and drank if it was placed into his mouth and would go where you lead him but that was that. He was dead long before she had placed him on the funeral pyre, before she had smothered the life out of him. It was a kindness, in a way.

That was what she liked to tell herself, at any rate.

She also liked to remind herself that what had done had been right, whenever she heard Mirri Maz Dur screaming in her dreams, she had tried to sing. To the Great Shepherd that the Lhazareen worshiped as their god, she honestly believed that her god would protect her. That he would save her from the flames of the funeral pyre.

He didn't. And her song had turned to screams. And from her screams, came her dragons. It had all seemed so very easy back then, so very simple. But it wasn't, she wasn't sure if she would change her mind about what she had done to Mirri Maz Dur, if for nothing else then for the simple reason that the Dothraki respected strength more than anything else, if she had tried to let the Maegi live then her bloodriders would have more than likely killed her and then dragged Daenerys back to Vaes Dothrak.

Her life was over, even she wanted to spare her. She couldn't, at least that was what she said when the old words about it being justice grew tiresome of repeating. A different thought of that day came to her, sometimes they weren't about Mirri Maz Dur, sometimes they were about Drogo and how about just before she pressed the pillow to his face she had thought that she had saw some awareness in his eyes and his fingers twitching.

Other times it was about the things she had seen in the fire that night, fearsome visions and beautiful ones as well and yet like a dream it was so hard to remember what she had actually seen. That night was constantly in her thoughts, it would never leave. The girl she had been had died in those fires, and the queen she was now had been born from them.

And what a queen she was, stumbling through deserts of red sand half a world away from her throne. A throne she had never even laid her eyes upon. Viserys had described it to her, once or twice through their years of begging for scraps to keep them alive and all the kings who had sat upon it. At times it had seemed that had given him more than any food ever did. That was all he needed to live on.

Dany had never dreamed about the throne, not like Viserys had done. Her dreams were different, she had dreamt about her mother at least once or twice. In her dreams she was the most beautiful woman in the world, her eyes were gentle and full of kindness and she gave gold to beggars and at Tourneys hundreds upon hundreds of knights would compete for her favour, for her honour or even just to bring a smile to her face.

Other times she dreamt she was back in Bravos, in the house with the red door with kind old Ser Willem Darry and the lemon tree outside of her window. Viserys had always hated it there, had called it little more than a hovel that was not fit for a prince and princess of the seven kingdoms but Dany had always loved it, more than anywhere else. Far more than any castle or manse. She had always wanted to stay there, when she had been little being a princess was just a game.

And still other times she had dreamt she was a dragon, flying all the way across every sea and mountain. All the world looking so very small below her as her great wings caste dark shadows. She loved those dreams the best, the freedom it gave her. The only freedom that she ever seemed to have.

But still, she could not sleep the rest of her life away and dreams faded in the morning light. Shaking her head to clear away her thoughts she stood to her feet and swallowed some water from the skin at her side and once again she had to revel in how much joy such a simple thing like clear water brought to her.

It was hardly the coldest water in the world, it was tepid at best, but it was clear as the surface of a pond and it did not make any of them ill to drink it and thus in her mind was a significant improvement to the foul brown pools they had found out in the red wastes.

There were more wells scattered around the pale city and all the water from them was just as clear, it made her wonder if there was more clean water under the desert just waiting to be tapped. Maybe her khalasar could dig for it, they could make more wells but along with that they could use the water to feed any plants.

Perhaps they could make the entire desert bloom.

It was a nice thought but she realised that she was getting ahead of herself, aside from the fact that her khalasar was still to weak from their journey through the Red Waste and to do such a thing would require younger and stronger men than she had, she wasn't even sure if they even had any seeds and just because there could be water under the red sands doesn't mean that anything planted would grow.

"Come, let us go and see what my bloodriders have found." She spoke to Irri and Jhiqui as she stood, The city wasn't as large as any of the nine free cities she had spent any time in but there were still many crooks and crannies which still needed to be searched, many of the smaller houses still needed to be searched as did most of the larger ones as her Khalasar had spent the first night in the city of bones in one manse, the largest of all of them that were still standing at any rate.

It didn't take them long to find her bloodriders, along with a large amount of her Khalasar, searching in and around a large manse for anything that could be useful. Daenerys spied Aggo strolling out of the manse with a large statue that was made out of gold and carved into the shape of an animal that Daenerys did not recognise but she could safely say that she did not want to see the real one.

Jhogo and Rakharo were standing in front of a group of young boys, the oldest just old enough to grow fuzz on their lips and the youngest barely able to hold up an Arakh. Her three bloodriders and Ser Jorah were her only true warriors, she had a few outriders but they were not mean to fight only to scout and she had one old Jaqqa Rhan, a mercy man, but they weren't meant to fight either.

If she wanted her Khalasar to survive and this city to be protected then she would need warriors, the problem was that as Jorah had explained to her the Dothraki were never meant to guard cities, they were never meant to fight in cities at all. The Dothraki had no armour, preferring the speed that the lack of armour granted to them, and they spent their entire lives fighting from horseback.

They shot their arrows from their horses, they used their swords on horse back and they used their whips to corral their slaves from horseback. They weren't comfortable fighting on foot, they certainly could but they weren't as effective on foot. Jorah had told her that the Dothraki were a restless people and Daenerys had seen it first hand when she had been Drogo's Khaleesi.

Asking Dothraki to guard a city was as alien a concept to them as her being married to Khal had been to her when she had still been in Pentos. If it weren't for the fact that they had to regain their strength from their long trek then they would more than likely be insisting that they leave the city. But they couldn't, not yet at the very least.

She glanced around the small courtyard and she noticed that there was no sign of Ser Jorah anywhere to be seen, she turned with a frown from the courtyard and left it with Irri and Jhiqui trailing behind her. It took them close to an hour to find her knight, at least she thought it was an hour due to how far the sun had moved across the sky.

He was standing near the gates of the city with several older men of the Khalasar, gazing upon the broken gates and speaking among themselves about how they might try and fix them. Daenerys wasn't sure if the Dothraki would be of much help in this regard, fixing city gates wasn't often a problem that they would be faced with. More often than not they spent their time breaking them down.

Daenerys almost hadn't noticed that Jorah did not have his shirt on, revealing achest that was built like a barrel and covered with a thick mat of black hair. She couldn't blame him for wanting to remove his shirt, it was beyond hot and she would love nothing more than to walk around without this painted vest on.

"Your grace!" Jorah called out happily as he finally noticed her, walking away from the men and leaving them to examine the gates. "Forgive me, I did not see you. Is there something that you need?" He asked with a smile before he seemed to notice that he was shirtless and started to blush as he rubbed at the back of his head. "Forgive the state of me your grace, but the heat has been rather unbearable."

"There is nothing that I need to forgive Ser Jorah, do not concern yourself." Daenerys said with a smile of her own and Ser Jorah nodded, all though he seemed glad that she was not angry with him. "How comes the gates? Can we fix them? If we are attack then we're going to need them."

"Well, I truly doubt that anyone actually knows that we are here your grace, and this city is dead so I don't think that we are in much danger of anyone stumbling upon us. Still, you are wise to make sure that the gates are repaired. As to if we can repair them..." Jorah let out a heavy sigh before he turned to face her. "My queen, might I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Do you truly mean for us to stay here? We are far away from any ports my queen. If you truly wish to return to Westeros and take your father's throne then we must find a place for us to take ship. I think that Port Yhos is still our best bet as I know where it is...vaguely. But I am also aware of another city called Qarth which is also by the sea, although I am not as sure where it is."

"Even if we could find either of these places my sweet bear, what do we do then? We have no coin to buy passage on any ship. I also doubt that we will find any ships willing to take the both of us and the rest of the Dothraki and all of their horses." Dany couldn't stop herself from biting her bottom lip after she had finished speaking, it had not occurred to her before now really how hard it would be for her to get back to Westeros with the Dothraki in tow.

It wasn't just a matter of finding enough ships to take them back, though that would be as difficult as to be impossible, no Dothraki had ever crossed the narrow sea, they had never crossed any body of water. They called any sea the Poison Water, their horses could not drink it and thus they did not trust it and they would not cross it.

"I do not think that we would find ships for them your Grace, but I do have some coin on me. Enough to charter a ship for the both of us to take us back to Pentos, from there we can make a plan on what to do." Daenerys didn't hear herself gasp as her ears were filled by the sound of Irri gasping and Daenerys turned around to look at her and Jhiqui.

Irri stared at her with her amber eyes blown wide, not wanting to believe that she would abandon them. Jhiqui seemed more defiant, her arms crossed as she levelled a heavy glare on to Ser Jorah, seeming so very fierce even though she was smaller than Daenerys was.

They honestly thought that she was going to abandon them, she supposed it made sense in a way. She had no memories of the seven kingdoms nor did she speak of them often but Viserys always had, had spoke of their beauty and their glory and how they would return there one day soon, when he had his army.

It only made sense that they would think that she would want the same, and she did want the same. But she wouldn't abandoned them. Irri and Jhiqui were the closest thing that she had ever had to sisters and Aggo, Jhogo and Rakharo were blood of her blood, she wouldn't leave them.

It was her that had brought them through the Red Waste, it was because of her that they had lost friends and loved ones. She owed them all a debt, she had a duty to them.

And so, she turned to face Ser Jorah and looked into his eyes with an impassive face. She could already tell that he would try and change her mind. "I thank you for your honest advice Ser Jorah, as I will always require it. But this is my Khalasar, the blood of my blood. I will not abandoned them."

Ser Jorah did not seem pleased with her decision and looked like he was about to say something else about it but Daenerys glared at him to make it clear that she had said her final word on the subject. Her bear let out a sigh before turning to look back at the gates, one was broken in half while the other was hanging from it's hinges.

Dozens of arrow shafts were deeply embedded into the wood of the doors and the wood had clearly been burned black in some places. Not for the first time Daenerys wondered exactly what had happened here, she did not even know this city's true name or how it had met it's end.

Whatever had happened here had not happened all that long ago, in many of the houses they had found that most of the food had rotted but was still recognisable as food and fruit was still growing on the trees. It had been a great worry since they had found this city, that whoever had sacked the city might come back.

She was so busy in her thoughts that she almost didn't hear Ser Jorah speaking to her. "We would need good wood to replace those doors, your grace. There are few trees in the Red Waste, and we would need iron to reinforce them if they were to hold up to a decent siege. None of which we have."

Daenerys sighed as she crossed her arms and glanced at the gates for a few moments as she tried to think, it was true that there were not many trees out in the Red Waste and the few they had seen did not seem the highest of quality to her. There were fig trees inside the city but Dany didn't think that there would be enough wood to even fix one of the large doors if they used the wood of all the fig trees.

And as it stood the fig trees were the only source of food that they had at the moment, they had the horses as well but they needed them to ride and they only had so many horses that they could use.

"Are there any other cities near us? Perhaps we could find something useful or if there are people inside we could perhaps set up a trade of some sort?" Even as the words left her mouth she was struck by the stupidity of them, what did they have to trade? Figs and Horses?

"We can arrange the outriders to scout if that is your wish your grace." Daenerys was quiet for a few moments as she did not relish sending her people back out into the waste again but she also knew that it had to be done.

She nodded her head once. "Yes, gather them Ser Jorah. I have to see to something, I will be back in a moment." And with that she turned her around and walked away, Irri and Jhiqui her silent shadows as always, before too long they arrived back at the manse where they had been before they had started to look for Ser Jorah and with a shout she called her bloodriders to her.

"Jhogo, Aggo, Rakharo, I have a task for the tree of you. Ser Jorah is calling together the outriders and I will soon send them out to search the waste for anything that might be of use, any cities that we might go to. It is my wish that you go with them, to help better the search."

All three men stared at her for a few moments, none of them blinking. A part of her knew this was coming but she had hoped that she would be able to avoid it.

It was Aggo, the oldest of her three bloodriders that she had granted the dragonbone bow and the one that she was the least close to that finally spoke out. "Khalessi, we are blood of your blood. Our place is at your side, to guard your back and to kill your enemies."

"It is known." Irri said from behind Daenerys and Jhiqui, Aggo, Jhogo and Rakharo all echoed the words, Daenerys had to do her best to stiff a sigh. The Dothraki were set in their ways, if they thought that what you were doing was wrong then they would say and they had said so often when it came to Dany.

She was the first Khaleesi to rule a Khalasar, asking them to trust her and to follow her required a great deal of trust on their part and if they had not seen her walk into that fire survive and come out the other side with three baby dragons then she doubted that they would have followed her anywhere.

"Perhaps it is known, but this not about us blood of my blood. Do you think I would send you away? Do you think I enjoy the thought of it anymore than you do? I do not. But the Khalasar must know what dangers lie ahead and where we might go, so that we can leave this dry waste behind us. I ask that you do this for me." She then straightened her back, Viserys and Illyrio always told her that was how a queen stood. "Do not make me make it a command." She prayed her voice sounded stronger than she felt.

Her three bloodriders glanced at one another for a moment before Jhogo took his coiled whip and laid it at her feet before he kneeled in front of her, his head bowed and his long dark braid touched the ground. "Blood of my blood, I will do as you ask. As in all things."

Rakharo followed soon after him, laying his curved sword at her feet as he knelt down next to Jhogo. Aggo followed soon after them but Daenerys noticed that there was a longer pause when he kneeled, though he still placed his bow at her feet. She made a gesture for them to rise and reclaim their weapons and then turned and gestured for them to follow her.

They arrived back at the ruins of the gates to find that Ser Jorah had gathered the outriders, she strode forward and turned to face the five men who stood before her. "You have followed me to this place, I know that has not been easy for any of you. I will not say that it has been easy for me as that would be a lie."

"I have lead you into this waste, I am more than certain that many of you thought that I was mad. I have often thought that I was mad. Where I come from they say that my family has always danced too close to madness, they said that times whether a Targaryen would be mad or a genius would depend on the flip of a coin."

She decided not to mention exactly why her line was so tainted with madness, she had never seen the Dothraki dealing with incest before but she decided that it was safer to go with the assumption that didn't already know about her line and how it was founded rather than risk everything.

Of course she was the blood of Old Valyria and all men knew something of the freehold and it's dragons, the Dothraki knew of them but she didn't know if they knew they had wed brother to sister.

"I don't know how the coin landed with me, that thought had terrified me. But what I do know now, is that if we look back then we are lost. We must keep going, we are regaining our strength as we stay here but we must know what lies ahead of us if we are to move forward."

"Jhogo, who is blood of my blood, I would ask that you take two of the outriders and ride to the north. Look for cities, look for lakes and rivers and towns. If you meet traders, speak with them so we might learn where a port might be."

"Rakharo, who is blood of my blood, take two more outriders and ride to the east and Aggo, who is blood of my blood, ride to the south with this final outrider and look for all the things that I have spoken of and return and tell us what you have found."

All of the men nodded and began to saddle their horses, as Daenerys watched them Jorah came up to her and tapped her on the shoulder before he lead her away. "Your grace, I do not think that it is wise to send your bloodriders away. They are the only true warriors that you have, aside from me."

"I know, but it is safer if they do not travel alone. My outriders will need protection and as you say it is unlikely that anyone will come looking for us hear, and even less likely that anyone will stumble upon us." Her words did not seem to sooth her bear much but they were all the words that she had for him.

She reached out with her hand and cupped his cheek. "I have a task for you, I would like you to take over the training of the boys while my bloodriders are gone. Teach them how the men of Westeros fight so they might be ready to deal with them when the time comes."

"Very well, your grace. But without armour they are at a disadvantage."

"Just do what you can, that's all I ask." And with those last words Daenerys turned to continue to watch as her riders prepared.

They almost seemed to be ready too soon and they began to ride out of the gate, Daenerys stood watching them as they went, all of them turning into featureless outlines as they rode towards the horizon. When she could no longer see any of them she let out a heavy sigh.

She could only hope that she made the right choice.

End of Chapter Two.


Sorry that this took a little while to get back too but I hope everyone enjoyed it, I know that at the moment the changes to canon seem subtle but I promise we will get there as you can probably call this fic a slow burn.

As always, constructive criticism is welcome and wanted and please favourite and follow in you enjoyed.

Love,

Doctorwhofan12345