Disclaimer: I own nothing.
A/N: thank you everyone who left a review, it keeps me inspired.
"Are you certain?"
The Lannister looked down at his little map before squinting over at the coastline. He did this two or three more times, tilting his head and trying to get a better view of the cliffs before finally smiling broadly and giving an eager nod. "Aye, it's amongst these caves."
Rhaego wasn't so certain and had consulted with the Red woman to see if her fires would reveal anything. He found that as of late he had often begun looking to the priestess for answers, though he was disappointed more often than not. "The flames show many things my prince," she had told him. "Sometimes R'hllor may grant us visions of the future, sometimes he sends us visions of the distant past. It is up to the reader to make sense of them, and unlike mighty R'hllor we mortals are flawed."
Yet when he asked her to look in the flames this time she returned to him with a proud smile. "Your lion has the right of it; you will find what you seek in a cave along the cliff."
The Khal gave her the briefest look of approval before turning his gaze to the rocky caves that littered the bottom of the cliff. The tide came in very close there and Rhaego could see that if they were inside during high tide there was a very real chance that his men would drown. Do I dare risk their lives for mere treasure? He brooded on that for a while, imagining the terror his riders would feel if they were submerged in water that their horses could not drink. Queen Daenerys had taught Rhaego when he was a child that there was nothing to fear from the sea, but he knew trying to tell his men that would do little good.
After a time he finally spoke. "Lannister, you and I shall go on alone. The men will warn us when the tide begins to rise."
If Gerion had any complaints with his orders then he did not let them reach his face, instead he gave a stiff nod and went about removing his tunic and boots. Rhaego took off his leathered vest and hide boots, handing them over to Jakerhro. When they were ready the two companions travelled along the shore, trudging slowly through the sand. The sea water lapped up around their ankles when they finally came to the caves.
"Which one has the gold?" Rhaego asked.
The gold haired man frowned a little and stared into the rock formations for a long time before finally answering. "The one on the far left."
It was dark in the caves, so dark that Rhaego could only vaguely make out what was three feet in front of him, yet the Lannister moved with a confidence and sureness of step. Finally after a half dozen turns they finally came upon a dead end….and a large, ancient chest. It was covered in glyphs that matched those on the Lannister's chest, though most were covered by years of moss.
The lid was half eroded away and malformed but Rhaego managed to tear it off of the chest and bask in what it held. There was gold yes and silver too. Various gemstones also speckled the bundle of gold, but what caught the Khal's eye was a long dark thing, ornately carved and with dragons at the base of the hilt. Rhaego pulled the sheath away and admired the blade with awe, his eyes flickered down to the runes that were engraved near the handle, it was vaguely Valyrian yet he could not read them.
Beside him Gerion had snatched his own sword from the plunder, one that was similar to one held in Rhaego's hand, only with a lion's head for a pommel. The man closed his eyes for a moment and pressed the sheathed weapon against his forehead, to Rhaego's surprise the Lannister was crying.
"It took me half my life to find this," he explained, wiping away the tears. "I travelled thousands of miles and saw things that no man should ever witness, and….I left my little girl behind, all for this."
Rhaego grunted and looked back down at the chest. There was more than enough bounty to keep his Khalasar happy and the Khal thought that he would like to keep the sword as his own while Gerion had his trinkets and mementos. Moving the chest from its home was a challenge. Rhaego was by all accounts a big man, and he had done his share of heavy lifting in the past, but never while trying to navigate through a dark tunnel that contained several unexpected turns. In the end he managed to move it out with Gerion's help and the Khalasar greeted them with a small cheer.
He took his vest and boots back from Jakerhro and allowed his men their share of the gold after Gerion had taken what he wanted. Mylessa approached him as he was struggling with a boot, a small smile at her lips. "That is a lovely sword my prince," she said. "May I see it?"
"Do as you will." He answered with a grunt.
The red priestess examined the sword closely. "All great heroes deserve a great sword, what is its name?"
"I know not," he said before finally rising to full height and shrugging on his vest. "Swords are not my preferred weapon." He thought of his great axe and wondered whether he would get a chance to feed it anymore blood. He hoped so.
After spending a few days near Volantis, Rhaego turned his Khalasar back to the Dothraki Sea. Though his bloodriders would question him, the Khal felt a bizarre obligation to the Lamb men for helping him on his way to Qarth, so he felt he owed it to them to at least give some coin for their troubles. The travelling was good and Rhaego could sense a calm settling over his men as they slowly moved along the familiar paths of their homelands. Even Lady Mylessa and her nightfires were becoming an accepted part of their life, and Rhaego noticed that a few of his men even took to standing with the woman as she sang her prayers.
"Have I met you before my lady?" asked Gerion one day.
Mylessa looked at the Lannister in confusion. "I do not think we have my lord, R'hllor has no temples in Westeros."
The golden haired man simply frowned. "As you say."
It was not the first time that the man had mentioned a familiarity towards the red priestess and Rhaego wondered why he kept going on about it. He seems haunted, the Khal reflected as he watched the Lannister's uneasy face.
"Back in that cave, you mentioned a daughter," said Rhaego when it was just him and his former cellmate riding ahead of the others. "I never knew you had children."
The usual gleam of energy left Gerion's face at that and he gave a sad nod. "Aye, a bastard daughter," he said after a time. "Her name is Joy, and she was barely four years old when I set off to find Brightroar."
For some reason that angered Rhaego, and he could not stop himself from asking, "Why would you sail to Valyria when you had a four year old daughter who needed you?"
Gerion winced at the Khal's words and he looked ashamed. "I thought…..that if I could reclaim this sword, the sword of my ancestors….if I could travel to Valyria and live to tell about it then perhaps some warmth would return to my House." His emerald eyes met Rhaego then. "We Lannisters are not the smiling, happy liars that men would call us. My father shamed us all and Tywin became a monster by trying to wipe away that shame."
"And you thought that a sword could solve all of your-" a sudden wind hit them then, powerful and carrying the stench of death and smoke on its wings. He turned his head to its direction and saw flames in the distance, plumes of greasy smoke coiling upward like great black snakes. The Lhazareen, he realized with a curse.
By the time they reached the village it was too late. In all his years Rhaego had seen much, but what he saw in that village was the closest thing to hell he had ever known. The local stream was choked with corpses. Several men were impaled upon stakes near the gates, maggots eating away at their eyes and face. The meagre huts that the Lamb Men had called home were mostly burnt to the ground, along with those few who had chosen to hide inside them, their bodies naught but blackened bones. Dogs were fighting over the head of one of the village elders while his body sat perched upon a cross, cut open from balls to throat.
Beside him Gerion wretched and several of his Kos weren't looking much better. Rhaego simply looked down at the mutilated bodies with practiced indifference, yet inside he felt a fire brewing in his heart. The Khal had no illusions about his own people's brutality but what was before him was more than rape and plunder, it was butchery.
Suddenly there was a terrible cry that rang out through the air, so long and agonising in its sound that it set their teeth on edge. It was the voice of a child. Before any of them had any time to react, Mylessa leapt from her horse and ran towards the sound. Foolish woman, thought Rhaego with a growl before following her.
What he saw when he found her would stay with him until the end of his days. Several of the little ones, children no older than five or six, nailed hand and foot along the support arch of the local temple. It was there that he found the source of the cries. A little girl hung from the wooden beam, red faced and screaming out in pain. Mylessa was already reaching up to try and pull the nails free but was struggling to do so, the whole time she was whispering reassurances to the child. Rhaego hurried up to help her and used a dirk to pry the pieces of metal out, careful not to hurt the girl any more than he had to.
Mylessa took the child in her arms once she was free, keeping her in a tight embrace in a desperate attempt to calm her screaming form. Rhaego had his men bring a skin of water over and gave the child a drink. After a time the girl finally stopped crying and fell asleep in the Red woman's arms, her little face tucked into the crimson robes.
"She needs to see a healer," said Gerion quietly. "Gods know how long she was up there."
Rhaego nodded grimly. "I'll have Joko inspect her wounds after she has settled. For now let her rest."
"Who could have done this thing?" asked Jakerhro.
Gerion's face soured and he spat in distaste. "Slavers most likely, there are lot of dead people here but not an entire village worth. No doubt the others were taken off to be sold at some auction, mayhaps in Volantis or Lys, though Slaver's Bay is likely where they'd end up."
Rhaego clenched his massive fists. "Cowards, the lot of them" he growled before brushing his thumb over his large axe. "Children and old men are one thing, but a fully armed man is another." He had the sudden urge to kill something. "Take the rest of the bodies down and burn them."
That night they made camp outside of the village, as far away from the smell as they could and tried to push away the images they had seen with drink and song. Try as he might, the Khal knew that he was not likely to forget the death he had seen any time soon, no matter how many drinks he had. Sleep won't be fun tonight, he mused bitterly while making his rounds of the camp. He had Joko make poultices for the girl's hands and feet, though applying them was easier said than done as the child kicked and screamed as soon as he touched her wounds and only when Mylessa held her did she cease her movements.
Rhaego decided to check into the girl's tent and see how she was doing yet as he approached he heard the soft sounds of a woman sobbing. Peaking inside he caught sight of Mylessa, sitting by the sleeping child's side, tears streaming down from her vibrant blue eyes. She looks young, he suddenly realised. It was easy to look at the priestess with her ominous prayers and piercing gaze and overlook how young she really was. If the Khal had to guess he would say she was even younger than him and now that he saw her in a moment of utter vulnerability he wanted to go to her.
As if sensing his gaze she looked up suddenly and began wiping away at her face. "Forgive me my prince, I…"
"There is nothing to forgive," said Rhaego as he knelt down beside her. "What we saw today was enough to make even the most hardened of warriors squeamish."
"Slavers," Mylessa whispered.
Rhaego nodded sadly. "Gerion thinks they're headed back to Yunkai or Meereen or one of those cursed places."
They were silent for a time, watching the rise and fall of the little girl's chest. He wondered if the child would ever move past today or if the Slavers had permanently burnt themselves into her young soul. He did not wish that sort of life on anyone and silently prayed to the Great Stallion and Mylessa's red god that the child would be too young to remember it.
"I was no older than this child when they sold me," said Mylessa quietly, her eyes never leaving the girl. "My mother was a foreigner seeking refuge when she arrived in Asshai, she did not speak the language nor did she have much coin. My earliest memories are of me and her huddling together in the streets for warmth."
Rhaego brought his purple eyes on her. "Where was your father?"
Mylessa's mouth went into a thin line. "He died before I was born, though my mother told me he was a king who was killed by his own men in some war against the Lions of Westeros. It was only the two of us, and on the streets of Asshai two mouths can be difficult to feed." The faintest of smiles came upon her face. "We used to go and sit at the Red Temple and watch the Nightfires, the flames were so big and warm, warmer than you'd ever believe. When…..when she died I had nothing, and it wasn't long before one of the men caught me." Tears found their way back down her cheeks again. "I was…lot number five. No name, just a damned number. It was only by the mercy of R'hllor that I found my way into his temple instead of a brothel."
The Khal took the woman's delicate hand within his own and gave it a gentle squeeze. When he looked at her he could feel the fire return in his chest and for a moment he felt like a dragon. "I promise you, we will not let them take any more children. By fire and by blood I promise."
Mylessa looked at him for a moment, uncertainty on her face before leaning over and bringing her lips to his own. She tasted of spice and heat, and in that moment the blind flood of the Khal's desire swept all other thoughts away as the two lonely souls met.