(Dragonstone: 10/31/298 AC) Cressen IV
"It has been a week since Prince Oberyn's departure back to Dorne and still the troubles continue to pile on. Must this month get any worse?" the young knight sighed, pacing around the room like a commander. Given the current state of affairs, Cressen found himself thinking that the Silver-Tongue's golden vest with black stag stitching appeared more like a banner amidst a battlefield than a mere article of clothing.
"The summons for Prince Oberyn was sent out from Sunspear before his arrival on the island. There was nothing to be done about that, nor could it have been prevented," Nong coughed her words, the ancient Trade Minister having never shown her advanced age until now. Though still nearly two decades younger than himself, the Trade Minster had not taken the news, of Lady Azula's incapacitation, well. Only recently had she accepted the woman's state after seeing her thrashing body.
"However, Lord Stark's wishes to return to the capital can be, if you believe that is what the Fire Lord would've desired?" Commander Meng added behind shaded eyes and a ghostly expression. Despite the near haunted look, upon his face, the majority of the man's features still held a certain sternness that all of the Lady Baratheon's Fire Nation officers shared. The table grew silent, awaiting a response to the question.
"What would you have me do? Hmm? Hold him against his will? He's nearly emptied the rookery with his letters, so what would be the point? At the very least, he seems to be planning to marshal the north," Steffon replied, as he collapsed beside him, into his father's seat. "Besides, such an act would only serve to needlessly antagonize the Lord of Winterfell. Not to mention, ruin my reputation as an honorable host. You forget, Commander, that this is not the Fire Nation. Lord Stark and his men have partaken of the offering of bread and salt. If he wishes to return and inform the King, so be it, but it would not be ideal. Not for what my mother had planned," the Baratheon Knight rubbed his chin. The smell of cherry-blossom lingered about the boy, within the all too quiet, yet nearly full council room of the Lady Azula.
"You are too young to be despondent. Leave that for the elderly," the old woman attempted to console the distraught young man and found partial success.
Looking at her, Cressen could not help but feel the same, as Azula Baratheon had always seemed invincible to him. The stress of nearly a fortnight of plight weighed down just as heavily upon the Maester of Dragonstone, as it most assuredly did the other, but without others with which to speak with, he found himself isolated within the dreary council chambers of the Administration Complex.
"Heh. Were it only so easy?" Ser Steffon snorted and looked up towards the banners of the Burning Stag surrounding them. "Unfortunately I cannot afford to be free of distress. Regardless of Oberyn and Stark, the main problem we face is my mother's current situation. Who even now claws at phantoms and demons in her sleep. If one would even call it that…" Steffon spat in contempt, his golden eyes glistening in the torchlight.
'Not at the state of his mother, no,' Cressen knew, after having borne witness to the boy holding his mother as she screamed.
"The burning woman! The black crown!" the Maester recalled her cries, and looking at the young man's golden eyes, he saw hints that her son had too.
'Now he seems lost without her.' Even as he thought it, the idea still confused him as the son of Stannis had often readily displayed a keen, almost ruthless, intellect and such a strength of character that had he the ability to choose anyone in Westeros who could survive without a guiding hand, the young knight would be his only choice. But looking at him now, he saw that it was simply in the young man's nature to love his family, to worry about them, even one such as his mother who had been less than loving, though he would never say it. "We will find a way to help her," he whispered to the Baratheon Knight, while in the back of his mind he yearned to know what precisely had caused her condition.
"I pray to the gods that we can," Steffon replied, in an equally low hush. "The people cannot see her in such a state. Not now…"
"We've tried everything. Teas, draughts, even the red priests have attempted to wake her, and still, the Fire Lord screeches and claws at something beyond our sight. Foul spirits, I say," Chang, the bending instructor, pointed out as if he had been part of their private conversation. "We should recall, Lord Stannis, and Qyburn. Perhaps the Fire Lord's connection with her husband can improve her circumstances, and if not, perhaps the mad Maester can concoct something from his stores that can see her back to full strength? He does have a talent for bringing people back from the brink." The strange Yi-Tish man suggested, locking his fingers together, and seemingly gauging the responses of those present.
"Certainly not," the young man adamantly refused. "The wrong people would notice such a summons, and even if I thought the idea prudent, my father is on a hunting expedition with the King. I cannot trust the words to reach him, and only him, in a quick manner."
The disagreement had stunned him, "You would keep your father blind to the knowledge that his wife could perish? It's been two weeks, how long did you plan to keep this between us?" he pressed, looking around the room.
"My mother keeps us blind to many things, old friend, and for good reason," Ser Steffon's voice faltered, if only somewhat, but quickly regained its steely composure with the next. "My father will understand the need for silence, more than he would understand the need to break it."
"Eventually you will have to tell the students, and the smallfolk besides, of the Lady Azula's situation, and word will eventually find its way back to King's Landing. Already rumors are making the rounds about the island. Though of what, I have conflicting information on, but the most interesting rumor I have heard was that an Other was present on the island?"
"The Mormont girls, are just that, little girls. Little girls with fanciful tales. They know not of what they speak, and my sister has no memory of what transpired," Steffon countered, though a concerned looked passed through his shining eyes.
"Normally, I would agree, but since my only reliable sources seem to be hoarding the truth for themselves, what am I to do? What good is an advisor if they are not informed?" he said, causing the others to shift in their seats. His rising suspicions had already begun to gnaw at his old, but sharp mind.
"You wish to be informed? Fine, have it your way then," Steffon answered with a twinge of irritation. "There was an Other on the island, but it dead now, shattered to a million pieces by my mother, but not without first leaving its mark upon her. Along with most of its reanimated puppets, I should add. Several of which, have been kept 'alive' for further study. Oh yes, Maester, the Others can indeed raise the dead. Oh, and our healer? Sanro? Whose chair, if you haven't noticed, is currently empty, was found torn to pieces in his lab within the caverns. A bloody mess, all around, though I suppose such a fate would have awaited him had he survived. My mother does not suffer incompetence. You have my apologies, Cressen, for revealing this terrible news, but now that you know what transpired, you must keep this as quiet as possible. At least until…"
"Until what? The predicament we currently find ourselves in was caused by the Fire Lord's own pride and insistence on secrecy. Had the totality of this council been involved since the beginning, then perhaps we wouldn't be down an Overseer and a Fire Lord, or be headless on how to proceed in whatever other plots the Fire Lord had brewing?" Chang stated matter-of-factly, almost bristling with confidence now that the Lady of Dragonstone and the Overseer were indisposed.
As much as the man had disquieted the old Maester, and he knew not why, in this instance, Cressen had found himself agreeing with his words, even as the shock of an Other having been so close to him lingered in his mind.
"Azor Ahai has not yet passed, you parasite," a wave of anger, unlike one he had ever seen before, clouded the blonde Red Priestesses' yellowish eyes, when she spoke. "R'hllor has plans for her yet. I have seen as such in the flames."
"Bah!" the man scoffed. "You priests and your mad prophecies!"
"She will wield the power of the Red Sword, burning away her enemies, and that foul mark upon her arm," the woman's eyes narrowed towards the aged instructor. "And you? I will not allow you, of all intrusive little creatures, to judge otherwise." Having never been one to speak much during council meetings, Cyvia's words had caused many surprised looks around the table, even from the normally stoic bending instructor to whom she addressed. Several of those present began chattering amongst themselves, save for Tima the historian, who rubbed at her silken, crimson sleeves.
"Enough!" the young knight slammed his fist upon the gilded table, rattling it as if it had been struck by a hammer, and quieting them all. In his eyes, Cressen found the same burning intensity he did within the Lady Azula's. "Do not press, my patience, Instructor," he growled. "I will not tolerate disparaging words of my mother. Of your Fire Lord. She did what she thought was best, and a Fire Lord's decision is without…"
"Reproach?" Chang continued, dismissing the young knight's rebuke. "Yes, we know. Her father felt the same, and yet he always valued my council. Even if he didn't always agree with it."
"This isn't Ozai's court, old man," Steffon countered, in a low hiss reminiscent of the Lady Azula's own. The council table seemed to withdraw as the young knight and aged instructor glared at each other from across the table.
"This isn't any kind of court, young man," Chang shot back, his face still flat and emotionless.
"Even if it was," Tima cleared her throat, breaking the argument before it escalated. "The same type of procedures would still apply, yes?"
"I presume you mean the line of succession?" he answered, acutely aware of where the conversation was going the moment the historian had opened her mouth, even as his thoughts kept drifting towards the apparent return of the Others.
"Ursa? No, she's not ready. She's far too headstrong, and doesn't have the correct attitude for court politics and intrigue," the Silver-Tongue shook his head, the hesitation evident within his typically confident voice.
"But," Tima pressed, "in the event of a Fire Lord's incapacitation and faced with an indeterminate ability to resuscitate, the heir should be summoned. As it was with Fire Lord Azulon, so must it be with her. Though in this case, while I hope such action proves unnecessary, I am certain that Fire Lord Azula would feel no different in the off chance that it does," the woman scanned the table, her eyes seemingly hunting for reinforcement but finding nothing but silence and a razor-thin smirk upon Instructor Chang's leathery face.
'The rest of them almost seem afraid of acknowledging such a thing,' he tilted his head but held his tongue.
"She will not be recalled from Winterfell unless my mother is truly dead," The young knight looked to him. "Her heart still beats strong, does it not, Maester Cressen?"
"It does," he answered, now wondering on how to proceed with the knowledge that the owner of the black, frostbitten, handprint marring her arm was apparently from some mythical beast. "But I…" he began to say before he felt a chill in his bones. Looking around, he noticed the flames begin to burn bright blue while light wisps of icy breath left the mouths of their small group.
"My, my," an eerily calm voice rang out from beneath the archway of the double-doored entrance to the council chambers. "Quite the ruckus my little brush with death seems to have caused. Had I known it would cause your stones to grow, Chang, perhaps I should've died so they could explode? Spirits know you need a little excitement in your life."
"Mother!?" "Fire Lord!?" "Fire Lord!?" the others shouted in surprise, rising from their chairs in a rush, before presenting palm-over-fist.
"My lady," he added with the others, and although his age prevented him from moving as quickly as those present, it allowed him to observe the silhouette of the Lady of Dragonstone. She lingered there, hands at her back, with her head and top left-half of her body shrouded in shadow. A pair of twinkling golden lights marked the area where her eyes would be, and at her side, stood the form of Eddard Stark.
"How?" the Silver-Tongue questioned, his eyes nearly bursting into tears. "You were…"
"Having a nightmare? Yes. It was a long torturous one, about a burning woman with a black crown, but I got better after I choked her to death. Now? What were we debating? I'm sure Lord Stark would wish to be privy to our little discussions," she continued, stepping out into the pale blue light, and revealing a near snowy white complexion.
