Chapter 23

Surprisingly, it all came together rather simply after that.

Robb had his lords and bannermen secure the city and dispatch any red cloaks they came across. Joffrey and an irate Cersei were shipped off to the Black Cells to await what Melara hoped would be a speedy trial and Robb had then given orders for the entire keep to be searched so that anyone still loyal to the Lannisters would be rooted out and placed under guard.

The small party who had broken into the keep with him were all given various tasks, some of which were placing small council members like Lord Varys and Grand Maester Pycelle under guard. Melara had been only too eager to see the latter clapped in irons and rather forcefully put into a room.

After then, every room in the keep had been searched and stripped of its secrets, whether people or objects.

This was a task Melara had taken to with gusto, there were few things she liked better than uncovering hidden knowledge and she had a sinking suspicion that the Red Keep was full of it.

And so, with the help of her brother Ben, the two had trekked down to the lowest part of the keep searching for anything and everything that might be hidden from unknowing eyes.

The lower they descended, the narrower the stairs became and the dimmer the light until they were both forced to rely on a torch and her magic to light their way.

Melara had heard of several chambers and tunnels beneath the Black Cells in the history books she had read and she was eager to get to them, intent on seeing just what if anything was buried in this dull recesses.

Ben's wariness increased each time they descended to a new level and his eyes darted about as if seeing hidden threats in every shadow.

"I very much doubt that any red cloaks would be hiding down here Mel," he said finally and Melara snorted.

"One thing I have learned in this life brother is to never trust a Lannister. They may shake your hand with their right hand but behind their back they will have a dagger. I would rather spin them around and remove it rather than wait to see if I shall be stabbed."

A moment of silence passed between them before Ben spoke again. "Were you always aware of the king's…..transformation?"

Melara looked back at her brother as they walked down the darkened stone corridor. "You make it sound as if he has an illness of some kind. And yes, I've known about it as long as he has."

"And how long is that?"

"A few weeks," Melara replied. She sensed her brother was about to ask more questions so she hurried to cut him off before he could. "Look, Ben, this entire situation has become infinitely more complicated and right now, certain people up above us view Robb as a beacon of hope, a northern myth come to life."

"Is he?" Ben challenged but she could tell it wasn't meant to be derogatory. "What blood do the Starks have that allow them such giftings? And why is it that such things as magic seemed to manifest in such strange ways?"

"That would be a question for a septon or perhaps a green man brother," Melara said wryly. "But if I were you I would ask the green men, they seem to be more liberal when it comes to questions about magic."

All of a sudden she came to a halt in front of a rather large door. It stood taller than her by half and its make was solid oak. There was a small window at the very top of it that was wrought with iron bars and the handle appeared large enough for a giant's fist.

"What is this?" Ben asked from behind her, his voice had turned grim with trepidation. "Did the Lannisters know of this room or was it yet another secret from the reign of the blasted Targaryens?"

"You're full of questions today brother," Melara said with some amusement. She placed both hands on the door as if she were going to push it open. "And I am only going to be able to answer this one."

She closed her eyes and concentrated for a moment on the magic, calling it to her, searching for a focus that was sometimes hardwon with the departure of her wand.

All of a sudden a rush of energy poured into her and her answering grin was one of triumph. "Alohomora."

There was a moment of tense silence and then the brunette pushed against the door with all her might. A momentary resistance followed and was then replaced with a horrific squealing noise.

Both siblings cursed under their breaths and fought against the urge to place their hands over their ears.

Judging from the noise and the clatter, the door hadn't been opened for at least a decade which only lent weight to the gravity of Melara's worries about what might be buried behind that door.

The air in the dark beyond was musty and damp causing the young queen to cough and place a hand over her mouth. The scent that overwhelmed her was difficult to place but it was heavy and smelled of the press of earth all around one's senses.

Just how far down are we? She thought to herself.

She took another breath and then stopped cold before moving further in.

There was something there….something in the air of that place that wasn't quite right, something sharp and heady, almost like incense that had yet to be lit, a stabbing concentration that was unfamiliar and yet eerily dangerous.

Have I smelt this before?

And then she remembered.

At the Battle of Hogwarts, one of Malfoy's goons had summoned Fiendfyre without knowing how to control it. She had been with Ron, Potter and Granger at the time and remembered the rush and the roar as the heat had sucked all the oxygen out of the room. Before sense and memory had returned to their limbs, causing the four of them to turn tale and run, for there was no fighting Fiendfyre when it was used against you, Melara remembered, even before the oppressive sensation of breathing in pure heat, she remembered the smell.

And it smelled just like this.

How is that possible?

"Ben," she said in as calm a voice as she could manage, even though she wanted to slam the door shut and go careening back down the hallway, race up the stairs and back to the light. "Please hand me your torch…and then don't come any closer."

There was a long moment of silence but when her brother didn't ask questions and she instead felt the press of wood into her hands, followed by the receding shuffle, she knew he had read in her tone that they were in a dire situation.

Swallowing hard, Melara muttered the words to the only spell that was coming to mind, one she knew would shield her best. "Protego."

There was a flash of red light and she exhaled when she opened her eyes to find the red shield having formed a protective dome over her. Whatever was in this room, at least she was now somewhat prepared to face it.

"What are you doing?" Ben asked quietly from his place back by the wall but his sister didn't answer.

Instead, she raised the torch a little higher and stepped onto the stony threshold of the room.

From there she went no further.

It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the light of the dimness of the space, a moment of holding her breath and feeling the tenseness tighten her shoulders into hard knots.

But finally, when the torch penetrated the dark enough to make out shapes, Melara was able to see that she was standing just outside of a long room.

It reminded her in some ways of a stable with two aisles running horizontally down the left and right sides of the door. It had a low ceiling like a stable would have but not so long that she would need to duck if walking into it.

A few more seconds went back and her eyes adjusted to the dim light the torch was providing even more to make out secondary shapes…namely the long racks that rested on either side of the room, racks upon which rested barrel after barrel after barrel.

Why would someone build a storage room this deep beneath the keep? The queen wondered to herself. What could possibly last for so long in the dark like this? And how long has this storage been here?

She was about to take a step forward into the room when all of a sudden, the long shadows and dim on the walls leapt forward and hit the floor, causing it to glisten.

Melara paused as she looked at the floor then and then felt her eyes widen.

The floor was a veritable moat.

It was covered in a strange green substance that glistened like the water of a pond that was filled with algea.

Only this substance was opaque and still, so still in fact that it might have been a complete solid.

Somehow however, she knew that it wasn't.

It covered every inch of the room, filling the cracks between the stones and nearly coming up to the threshold where she was standing.

The longer she looked at it, the sharper the scent of the room became, almost as if it were leaning towards her, beckoning her forward.

She cast her eyes back towards the barrels on the walls and realized that there was a crack in one of them, causing it to leak. The same green substance covering the floor was dripping from the barrel and the space around the crack was soggy, almost as if the barrel had rotted through from the concentrated it was containing.

Her mind quieted for a moment, searching through possibilities, overturning memories of Fiendfyre from her previous life and wondering if it were possible to turn such a substance into a liquid form.

And then she remembered something, something from a history book long forgotten, a few years into her life in this new world.

She had been hungry for information, desperate for knowledge, needing to understand everything that was happening to her and how to get along in a word so different from her own.

She knew this substance, she knew what this was.

The study of alchemy when she was first able to read had long since fascinated her, how to transform matter into things that were impermeable, undeniable.

Nicholas Flamel was supposed to be a master of alchemy, she remembered all too well the stories Ron had told her of his first year at Hogwarts.

But this was not gold.

And then she remembered her history, the story of a Targaryen king who had lost his life drinking a lethal substance that he believed would turn him into a dragon, a substance that only alchemists were capable of making.

Melara blinked and scrambled back a step, nearly losing her footing.

"What is it?" Ben demanded and his breaking the silence nearly caused her to jump from surprise.

It took Melara a few swallows to be able to speak around her dry throat.

"Ben, I think we need to close this door and go back up to the keep."

Her brother's eyes narrowed and he turned towards the entryway, grimness tightening his shoulders.

It didn't take him long to see what she had seen and a stream of curses poured from his mouth like a river.

"Is that – "

"I don't know," she said quickly cutting him off. "But if it is what I think it is, this is something that the king's ears alone must hear. It could throw the entire city into pandemonium if word got out, the gods only know how long its been here."

"Can you secure the door?" Ben asking shakily. "It's imperative that no one go in there. If anything goes wrong, if this door is opened for any reason and some poor soul stumbles in here without knowing its contents….the entire city could be destroyed."

Melara did some quick math in her head and openly shuddered. She was shaking and made no attempt to hide it. "Not just the whole city, if something were to set this off….the entire Crownlands could be destroyed, there would be a crater in the earth miles deep. The smoke might be visible from Dorne."

Ben swallowed hard a few times, his visage ghostly in the dim light and he immediately extinguished the torch. They were now lit only by the dim blue light of Melara's lumos charm.

Slowly he reached out a hand and pushed the door shut, backing away from it immediately as if even touching the wood might set the substance off.

Melara muttered a secure locking charm and pressed her hand to the door, watching as a blue light pulsed outward from her hand, expanding to encompass the entire door and the surrounding walls before it finally disappeared into the stone.

"Now what?" Ben asked, still sounding shaky.

Melara took a deep breath. "Now we alert the king and have this room emptied quietly, as quietly as possible. No one can know what is in here until it is properly disposed of. And I think, we are going to need to question the former queen….extensively."

Ω

It was hot.

It was a hot that one was accustomed too living in Dorne, but no matter the long years spent among the sands or by the ocean, the body never seemed to completely adjust. It would always sweat in an attempt to cool itself leading to annoying and sometimes embarrassing situations.

But today, Oberyn Martell was sweating for an entirely different reason.

He could feel the sweat dripping down his back as he stood impatiently before his brother in the Water Gardens.

The Prince of Dorne was being unnaturally quiet today, so quiet in fact that the Red Viper was nearly convinced that some magic had stolen his brothers muscles and replaced them with stone.

He was sitting as he usually was this time of day, in his wheeled chair overlooking one of the largest fountains in the Water Gardens. It was situated several feet away and he was sitting beneath a silken awning with his constant bodyguard, Areo Hotah standing next to him.

The guard's face was impassive as usual, his hand was near his sword to protect the prince as usual, his stance was consistent, even the sweat that could be seen on his upper lip was not out of place from the day before.

Everything about this day was consistent, natural, predictable, the same as it always was.

Except for the letter in his brother's hand and the thunderous silence throughout the garden it was just another day.

But it wasn't.

"Would you please say something?" Oberyn demanded abandoning his usual calm nonchalance. Few things made him truly impatient but being summoned by his brother with the news that the Lannisters had fallen to the Starks was not something one was patient about.

For years they had been plotting the downfall of Tywin Lannister and now they hadn't even had to lift a finger.

Nym and Obara who had spent the last few months in the capital, keeping an eye on the Lannisters and waiting for the signal had confirmed that after an assassination attempt at the wedding of Robb Stark in Riverrun, Tywin Lannister had finally stretched his arm out longer than he could draw it back.

Not only had the young king and his new queen, one Melara Frey, avoided the assassination, they had somehow managed to go after and overtake Lannister forces, stealing away both Jaime Lannister and his father during the night.

How they managed such a feat would have been bewildering enough if not for the continued news that somehow they had brought the Mountain with them.

Just thinking of that monster caused Oberyn's fists to clench. He had sorely wished many times for the wings and talons of a bird so that he might fly to wherever Clegane was and tear out the man's eyes.

All of this would take place before a very long and well thought out torture process kicked in.

The Viper had imagined all the things he might do to Clegane when he somehow had him at his mercy, all the pain he might reign down on him, taking away more and more of his agency until he was little more than a quivering mass of humanity….no doubt just like Elia had been.

He swallowed hard and blinked when he realized that Doran had finished reading and was now speaking to him. "I beg your pardon my prince."

"I said," Doran said in maddeningly patient fashion, "that this changes everything."

Inadvertently, Oberyn felt his fingers curl into fists. He certainly hoped that that wasn't all his brother had taken from the message. "And?"

Doran took in a section of the letter once more before looking back up at him. "It would seem that Robb Stark has penned this in his own hand. His terms are precise and measured. He intends to make for the capital and take it by force."

He let those words hang in the air for a moment before continuing. "He also wishes to state that we have no enemy from him. We both wish to wrest vengeance from the Lannisters and in his words, he "intends to see that we both have it."

Oberyn took a measured breath, his heart was pounding at a rate it had not in quite some time. "And how does he intend to do that?"

Doran held his silence for so long that Oberyn wanted to pull out his hair. "By giving us what we want. Tywin Lannister….and the Mountain."

This time Oberyn was in no rush to respond. All the air left his body for a moment and then raced back in as a fierce feeling almost akin to joy overwhelmed him.

No, nothing would bring back Elia or her children, no there was no way to reclaim the years that had been lost or release the grief that had settled over his shoulders like a shroud.

But at the very least, justice could be done. At the very least, this painful chapter, this excruciating decade could be put to rest and Elia would have her revenge.

"We are to retrieve them?" he asked, his voice barely rising above a whisper.

"No," Doran continued. "The letter writes that his queen will deliver, by hand."

A neared crazed giggle escaped Oberyn's lips causing his brother to raise an eyebrow at him. "Of course because what else could possibly happen? Do you realize brother that in the span of a few months, Westeros has been turned on its head? The wolf pup has somehow defeated the lion, although whatever sorcery has been used to pull that off I cannot say. Perhaps Robb Stark has been favored by the Seven, perhaps not."

"Stark is a northern product," Doran interjected dryly. "If any gods favor him, it will be the ones he grew up worshiping, the nameless, faceless ones that have been carved into their ancient trees."

Oberyn continued as if his brother hadn't spoken. "And now the lion has been drawn brother, drawn and near quartered! Tywin Lannister will be given to us on a silver platter! Him and his beast! They will be ours to torture, ours to abuse, ours to break for however long it suits us! Elia will be avenged! Why on earth aren't you celebrating?!"

This last question was a quiet shout directed at the older Martell who was sitting silently with his hands in his lap, waiting for his younger brother to complete his crazed monologue.

"Because Robb Stark has asked for something in return."

This statement lessened Oberyn's euphoria but only just. "And what is that?"

Doran glanced back down at the letter and back up again. "In exchange for an alive Lannister and Clegane, he has asked that we recognize him as King of Westeros. We will bend the knee to Robb Stark and whatever heirs he manages to produce."

Oberyn gave his brother a careful look. "Does this bother you?"

"At the moment….no," Doran said. "But in order to receive this bounty we will need to give up an independence we have enjoyed for over a decade. Baratheon was content to overlook us as was Aerys. One cannot help but think that Robb Stark will be a much more…curious king than his predecessors."

Oberyn shrugged. "We have committed no treason, given no one a reason to think we have something to hide. I fail to see how bending the knee to another king, one who is going to give up the only thing we have ever wanted for the better part of twenty years could be a bad thing."

"Suppose he fails to take the capital?" Doran countered, playing the role of pessimism as he had often done. "Suppose the remaining Lannisters sequestered behind those walls somehow pull themselves together and make something of a stand?"

Oberyn knew his brother was merely suggesting potential alternatives but he was hard pressed to stop himself from blinking. "Don't tell me you believe that

Cersei Lannister is capable of maintaining a military siege. Stark has taken the head and tail of the snake as well as its fangs! It is now a lifeless beast fit only for consumption! Do you truly believe that Kevan Lannister has the will or the skill to rally his brother's army? And to what end? We have received word that

Jaime Lannister has been executed by the hand of Robb Stark himself! We have nothing to lose by agreeing to this! Vengeance is finally ours!"

"You have no doubts at all?" Doran pressed.

"None," Oberyn said firmly. "In fact if Robb Stark's queen, this….Melara Frey will deliver our quarry to us, then I am very curious to meet her. After what he has done, any Stark will be forever welcome within Dorne."

"Very well," Doran said after a maddeningly long silence. "I will agree to the terms stated. I just hope that your optimism is warranted brother."

And then he called for parchment.

Ω

Don't forget to subscribe to my Youtube Channel if you have not already! The Channel name is Kaetie Mac, I really do appreciate it. Thank you all so much for the thoughtful responses under Child of Lightning. I have been a part of this community for about five years now and I love it more and more every time I post an update. This website has truly become my home away from home, a place for people as nerdy and obsessed with fantasy as me. I want you to know that I love you all and appreciate all your support and your commitment to following this story and the other ones I have posted. Thank you all for coming on this journey with me. Don't forget to drop a review and I will see you next time!