Argella

What did she know about this Lord of Dragonstone? Not much, in truth. If she was truly to be married to this man, it would serve her well to know more about him.

His dragon was called Balerion; that much Argella already knew. The other two dragons, Argella learned, were not Aegon's to ride at all. His sisters were the riders of Meraxes and Vhagar.

Or, his wives, rather.

Imagine actually naming your dragons. Well, Argella had named the first horse she had learned to ride, so who was she to judge?

On the other hand, she had named her horse 'Aggie', a more prosaic name than the grandiose-sounding Balerion, Meraxes and Vhagar.

But then again, maybe that was how all Valyrian names sounded. Aegon was simple enough, but the names of his sister-wives …

Imagine being married to your sister. No, not just one sister, but two. How strange it must be. One day you were playing in the treehouse together, and the next, you were sharing a bed. And doing more than merely sleeping next to each other.

Perhaps they were no treehouses in Dragonstone.

Did he alternate the days in which he would spend the night with each wife? Or did they share the bed together, all three of them?

I would never consent to that. He must come to me on his own, without his sister-wives trailing along.

She was the daughter of the Storm King, and one day she would be the Storm Queen. It would not befit her honor to be lumped together with his other wives.

Visenya the older sister, and Rhaenys the younger one. Those were their names, Argella had learned. Dragonrider and warrior, the both of them. She envied them. Oh how she envied them!

Perhaps … with three wives, Aegon would not come to her bed all that often.

That should be a disappointment, Argella knew, but in truth, she suspected she would find it a relief.

There was a knock on the door to her bedchamber, interrupting her thoughts before Argella could ponder the matter further.

"Enter."

Her maid walked in, in a rush, out of breath. "Princess Argella, your father bids you to attend him in the Great Hall."

"Has the envoy from Lord Aegon arrived?"

"Yes, my princess. He is here."

The Great Hall was filled almost to capacity, with the lords and bannermen sworn to Storm's End and the Storm King mulling around waiting for King Argilac to command Aegon's envoy to start speaking. Argella observed the faces, counted the numbers, scrutinizing which lords were present and which lords were absent. Her father would have done the same, or he would have done, back when he had been less troubled, less distracted. She had found him wandering the castle again last night, muttering about Harren the Black and his monstrous castle. Argilac's eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot this morning, and he looked as if he had not slept for days.

Lord Massey of Stonedance was not present, Argella noted. Neither was Lord Bar Emmon of Sharp Point. Both lords were from Massey's Hook, and there were those who whispered that Lord Massey and Lord Bar Emmon were too close to Aegon Targaryen for comfort, when by right they were sworn bannermen to the Storm King, not to Lord of Dragonstone.

Some men forgot their loyalty so easily. Or traded it from one king to another with impunity and scant regard.

Not that Aegon Targaryen was a king. He was merely a lord, even if he was a dragonlord.

Her father waved to Argella, summoning her to sit by his side on the raised dais. Argella made her way from the back of the hall to the front, conscious of all the eyes staring at her. She was used to it by now. She was no longer intimidated by the intent scrutiny, as she had once been, as a young girl.

King Argilac started speaking, and all the noises ceased at once in the Great Hall. "So you are finally here. We were beginning to wonder if Lord Aegon's envoy had gotten himself lost on the way to Storm's End."

The envoy looked nervous, clearing his throat before replying. "Your Grace, my master bids me to tell you that he receives your proposal with –"

The king waved off the pleasantries with impatience. "Yes, yes, honored, flattered and so on and so forth. Well, get on with it, man! Does he accept? Yes or no?"

The envoy hesitated. "Lord Aegon, while flattered by your offer –"

"No? So he refused?" Argilac's voice filled the Great Hall. "The Lord of Dragonstone refuses the hand of the daughter of the Storm King in marriage?"

There was pandemonium in the Great Hall. The lords were whispering and muttering, some exclaiming with anger. How dare he? Who does he think he is? Her father's fist was balled up in anger. Argella's hand grazed her father's clenched fist, and she whispered to him, softly, "Let the man speak and tell us the rest of Aegon's message."

The clenched fist relaxed, but his jaw was still working furiously. Her father's anger was terrifying to behold, even though it was seldom, if ever, directed towards Argella.

"The Durrendons are prone to fits of anger and uncontrollable fury," Argella's mother had told her when she was only a little girl, not long before she had died trying to give Argilac a son. "It is in their blood, this mercurial temper. Or perhaps they are taking their House words entirely too seriously for their own good. Ours is the Fury is not meant to be taken literally, I expect."

"They, Mother? But I am a Durrendon too," little Argella had protested.

Her mother had smiled and kissed the top of her head. "Yes, you are. But you have my blood too, and don't you ever forget that. Cool instead of hot, calm in the face of fury."

Argella had forgotten much about her mother, but never that. "Father, you must let him finish," she insisted to her father.

"Quiet!" Argilac shouted to the still-twittering men in the hall. He pointed his index finger to the envoy. "Speak. Now."

The envoy was looking pale. "Lord Aegon bids me to say that he is already a married man, with two wives to his name. He has no intention of seeking a third. But the alliance that Your Grace proposed is still of an interest to him, seeing that it could be a mutually beneficial arrangement for both sides."

"How is this alliance to be sealed, then, if Lord Aegon has no interest in our princess?" Lord Peasebury asked. Argella loathed the way the man had said 'our princess', as if she was their belonging to be given away to the highest bidder.

She would suffer only her father speaking or acting in that manner. No one else. Certainly not one of the lords who was sworn to be loyal to House Durrendon.

They think me weak and meek. Because I smile at their greetings and laugh at their japes, ask after the health of their wives and the prosperity of their children.

But that was nothing new. These lords had been underestimating her for years.

"Lord Aegon is offering his most trusted man, his loyal companion since childhood, his champion, Orys Baratheon, to seal the pact between Dragonstone and Storm's End," the envoy said.

Orys Baratheon? Argella knew the name. Aegon's third eye in the Seven Kingdoms, he was called by some. Aegon's spy, according to the less charitable. Orys Baratheon must have ridden his horse through most of Westeros in the last year, doing Aegon's bidding. He was spotted at Oldtown, meeting the High Septon in secret, the rumor went. He was at the site where Harrenhal was being built, negotiating a deal with Harren the Black, some said; trying to ascertain the strength of the castle and how it could be destroyed, others whispered. Rumors and confusion seemed to follow the man wherever he went.

There were other rumors too. Of a more personal nature. That the man was -

King Argilac stood up, his face flushed with anger, his voice like a thunder. "Orys Baratheon? His bastard brother? Aegon dares to offer me his bastard brother? Does he take me for a fool? Does he take my daughter for a fool? A baseborn bastard? I will not dishonor my daughter by marrying her to such a vile creature. I will not suffer the descendants of a bastard to one day rule over the Stormlands as Storm Kings."

"Your Grace, I can assure you, Orys Baratheon is a most honorable man. Most honorable. Lord Aegon would vouch for that," the envoy said, looking paler by the minute.

That only served to infuriate Argilac further. He walked off the dais and had the envoy by his throat before Argella realized what he was about to do. "Oh he would, would he? I suppose Aegon cares not for the shame his father brought to his own mother, and the shame he himself is piling on by taking this bastard into his service and making him his closest … what was it you said? Companion? But we do thing differently here. It is insult and dishonor he is offering me. Insult and dishonor! I offer him a prize more precious than gold, and he wants to repay me with shit! Shit!"

What happened next, what precipitated the envoy to open his mouth at that moment about the dower lands, continued to be a mystery haunting Argella for a long time to come. Perhaps the envoy thought he could defuse the situation by moving the subject off from Orys Baratheon. Or perhaps he was displeased by King Argilac's assertion that Aegon had offered him shit in return for gold. There was no way to know; the envoy was no longer around to be asked.

The envoy spoke quickly. "Regarding the dower lands, Your Grace, Lord Aegon would like to remind you that the lands you offer belong to King Harren now, and thus are not yours to give. But Lord Aegon would agree to accept them, if in addition, you would also consent to cede Massey's Hook, along with –"

Shouting. Yelling. Her father's voice and the assembled lords' voices drowning out the envoy's voice.

Massey's Hook. So that was why Lord Massey and Lord Bar Emmon were both absent today. Had they been discussing this plan with Aegon all along? She must warn her father. Treachery was afoot. Which ones of the other lords were also complicit?

Argilac, however, was concentrating all his anger on Aegon Targaryen, and by proxy, his envoy. "Cede Massey's Hook? He offers me his bastard brother, and he dares to demand other concessions? Dares to demand even more gold for the piece of shit he is offering? No, no, no! I will show him the just reward for daring to insult the Storm King and House Durrendon. Guards, seize this man."

The envoy protested. "Your Grace, I am an official messenger. I may not be harmed or –"

"Guards!" Argilac shouted.

Three guards came forward to seize the envoy. Argella tried to make her way closer to her father, but chaos and confusion reigned in the hall, and her way was blocked by men also trying to figure out what was happening. "Father!" She called out desperately. "You must not be hasty. Have some care," she wanted to tell him, but shouting it out loud for her father's bannermen to hear was not a wise move.

Argella was still struggling to reach her father's side, when he gave his command about the envoy's fate. "Cut off his hands. Both hands. Return them to Dragonstone to Lord Aegon. His bastard brother will never have my daughter's hand in marriage. These are the only hands his bastard will ever get from me."