Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to the Ice and Fire Novels, Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon TV shows. However, I decided to have a little play around with the characters. I do not earn any money from writing these stories, it is for my entertainment and is something I like to share.

Tyrion IV

Tyrion didn't want company. He was looking at books which were apparently going to interest him, which he wouldn't have minded, but now he was going to be assisted by an assassin. Why an assassin would be able to have any valid input into whatever he was going to find was beyond him. Of course he knew Arya had been doing some things for Bran in Essos, although he wasn't entirely sure what they were, because once again Bran had kept him in the dark. However he knew Arya hadn't been to Dragonstone, as the place had been evacuated when Drogon had first returned after the death of Daenerys, which meant Arya wasn't completely in the know with whatever Tyrion would find, but combined knowledge might help.

A room next to Tyrion's had been turned into a solar for the purpose of their research, the cobwebs dusted out, a new tables put in there, shelves on the wall, chairs, paper and ink. Most importantly there was a large carafe of wine, a pitcher of ale and a hot fire. Despite the candles flickering around the room, it still had a gloomy unused feel to it, one Tyrion hoped could be changed while he was working here.

In the centre of the room was the enormous trunk of books which Jon had brought back from Dragonstone. So far the only information Tyrion knew about the books was that there were around fifty and he had been using one of them to learn High Valyrian. All of the books came from Maester Gerardys' library, which had come as a shock as it was believed to have been destroyed. Therefore the books were two hundred years old undisturbed until now and delicate. Tyrion had never been so excited to read a book about a story he already knew. These, according to Jon, were first-hand eye-witness accounts of the Dance of the Dragons from the blacks. Jon had told him he had been learning High Valyrian from a book which had been used by and written in by Lucerys Velaryon, whose death prompted the start of the Dance itself.

Arya arrived to the solar a couple of minutes after Tyrion, closing the door behind her, flashing Valyrian steel the dagger she had used to kill the Night's King. Tyrion suspected she was making sure he knew his place, not like he was going to forget. The little girl he met was the most ruthless person he knew, but that was to be expected when you see the things a child like her had seen.

"I see you brought the dagger with you." Tyrion decided to break the ice. "Didn't Bran ask you to go and discover its secrets?"

"He did." Arya replied.

"And what did you find, in more than two words please." Tyrion raised an eyebrow.

Arya sat down and took the dagger from it's sheath. "It is old." she started. "Forged before the doom of Valyria. Owned by Aegon the Conqueror himself. It was passed down to the Targaryen heirs to the iron throne. The last heir to own it was Joffrey Baratheon, just before the assassination attempt on Bran's life." she explained.

"Ah, so that is why he wanted you to research it. Couldn't he see that in his visions?" Tyrion frowned.

Arya shook her head. "He needed the starting point. Being owned by Targaryens who were bonded with dragons blocked his visions. Dragons and what is happening around them, block his visions." she told him. "Does it surprise you who owned it?"

Tyrion remembered the day they left Winterfell for Kings Landing, he had told Joffrey to go see Lord and Lady Stark and to fall at the knee saying how sorry he was. Tyrion had slapped him three times to get the repugnant child to do the right thing. Clearly he'd done what Tyrion asked, but in a fit of rage decided to kill Bran in revenge for his humiliation. The little shit always had a perverse way of proving a point.

"No." Tyrion shook his head. "He was a repulsive creature. Deserved a far worse death than he got."

That was the comment which made Arya smile. "I think that you and I can agree on that." she said, yawning.

"Am I boring you already?" Tyrion asked.

"Tired. Hardly slept last night." Arya complained.

"You have my greatest sympathies. I am one of the few who understands your plight." Tyrion said as Arya frowned. "At least your siblings aren't twins. In fact they aren't even real siblings."

"They are to me." Arya snapped.

"I know." Tyrion said softly. "Which is why I understand how you feel. Especially as both of them are decent human beings. That can't be said for my sister." he looked to the ground.

"Don't you think we ought to start looking through these books?" Arya asked. "There's a lot of them and they're going to take a lot of reading."

"Have you any idea what they are about?" Tyrion asked.

"Something to do with the Dance of the Dragons." Arya shrugged. "It wasn't one of my favourite stories, I must admit. I was more a fan of the Warrior Queen Nymeria."

"Now that doesn't surprise me one little bit." Tyrion laughed. "Do you believe the story of Queen Nymeria?" he asked.

"Why shouldn't I?" Arya frowned.

"All stories fascinate me." Tyrion told her. "You see, anyone can take a series of events and create a version which suits their narrative, make it their truth." he told her, but Arya nodded.

"I know. I saw a group of mummers telling the story of my father's execution and joffrey's death. They made Cersei seem like a wonderful, sweet, kind woman. The facts were right, the truth was missing." Arya explained.

"Precisely. Which is where these books are useful. We know the events of the Dance of the Dragons, we have the stories told to us, but other than the events told to us, I suspect the true story is somewhat different." Tyrion said, pouring himself a cup of wine and offering one to Arya.

Arya shook her head. "I'll have ale! Why is the Dance important to us?" she asked.

"I thought you were smart." Tyrion frowned. "The war was fought among, after that they disappeared. Yet here we are, with a young dragon. Does that not perplex you somewhat? Who is Drogon's real mother? Where did they come from? Why did the three dragon eggs hatch for Daenerys yet nobody had managed to hatch an egg for almost two hundred years? Did she accidentally get the formula to hatch eggs right? Is the key to hatching dragon eggs among these books? Are there more dragon eggs lurking around? So many questions, and the answers may be found in this chest right here in front of us. Knowledge which has been lost to the world for almost two hundred years." he took a sip of wine. "Now, do you think the Dance of the Dragons is important to us?"

"Unless the intention is to breed dragons, then I don't see why it is so important?" Arya shrugged. "I don't think Jon has even considered it." she frowned. "They take years to grow."

"What if there are others?" Tyrion raised an eyebrow.

"Others, where?" Arya too a swig of her ale.

"Old Valyria." Tyrion suggested.

"Doesn't matter, nobody can go there." she replied.

"I've been." Tyrion told her. "It is full of stone men. The perfect bodyguards for dragons. Dragons are immune to it and there is no cure. The men have gone mad and attack as soon as you get there. You can't even fight them unless..."

"Unless you have a dragon." Arya nodded.

"Precisely. You can put a lot of men out of their misery and if you know how, bond with the dragons." he jumped down from his chair, opened the chest and began to remove books.

"But we only have one Targaryen." Arya got up herself.

"How long do you think that will last with your beloved siblings behaving the way they are?" Tyrion started to carefully pull out the books and sort them out. "And what if Jon were able to manage more than one dragon?"

"Why would he want that? He's just trying to protect his people and the North. He doesn't want to use Drogon." Arya got down on her knees to help pull the books from the chest.

As Tyrion began to sort through the books, he wondered how Jon had chosen them. Most of them looked to be personal records. "And what better way to protect those people with fire breathing dragons." he mused. "Although he probably didn't know what most of these books were. Many are titled in High Valyrian. But if he wanted to learn the language, I suppose they were obvious choices." he shrugged flipping through what looked like a diary. "Here." he passed one over to Arya. "Queen Alysanne . Her travels to Winterfell to meet with Alaric Stark and north to the Wall. Although this does take place before the Dance, but her dragon still participated."

"Ugh." Arya rolled her eyes before taking the book from him.

"Or you could read Maester Elstan's special dragon egg preservation recipe." Tyrion frowned.

"Why would you want to preserve eggs instead of hatching them?" Arya asked.

"Now you are asking good questions." Tyrion looked at her and began to quickly look through the book. It didn't take long for him to find what the book was really about. "This isn't about preserving the eggs until they hatch. This is about preventing them from hatching." he said reading the words in horror.

"What is it?" Arya asked.

"They bathed the dragon eggs in moon tea. Killing or deforming the babies inside." Tyrion said sadly.

"Is that why the dragons stopped hatching?" Arya asked.

Tyrion nodded. "I think so. The maesters killed off the dragons by preventing them from hatching in the first place. The ones at Summerhall would never have hatched. I wonder if Maester Corso knew and why he didn't prevent it from happening." he mused.

"Not if that book was kept hidden." she said. "Who wrote it?"

Tyrion read the notes and frowned. "Grand Maester Munkun. But he died years after Maester Gerardys."

"Maybe he was the one who had the library sealed." Arya suggested. "Although he didn't do a very good job of it if Jon was able to find it so easily."

"I suspect Daenerys eggs must have left Westeros before the poisoning started. The dance itself contributed to the downfall of the dragons, but whilst there were eggs and knowledge of how to hatch them, then it wouldn't matter. If the eggs stopped hatching..." Tyrion stopped.

"Do you ever stop talking? I'm trying to read. Reading is harder when the subject matter is boring." Arya yawned.

An hour later the room had fallen silent while they read through the books they had picked. He knew it would be interesting reading through the thoughts of people who were physically involved in the Dance, however Lucerys Velaryon's death was what triggered the dance, therefore a child's view wasn't really very insightful. The only interesting titbit had been how much Prince Aemond had changed after he bonded with Vhagar.

"This book is boring." Arya complained. "It's a love story." she closed the book to and randomly picked up another.

"I'd have thought a Queen riding to Winterfell on her dragon might have interested you." Tyrion raised an eyebrow, picking up the book Arya had just discarded.

Arya raised an eyebrow. "I've already seen a dragon Queen at Winterfell, it wasn't a pleasant experience."

"I wonder why this book would have been kept a secret if it was no more than a love story." Tyrion offered. "These books were in the hidden library for a reason. They weren't meant to be read by everyone, but they weren't to be destroyed. Why would anyone feel it necessary to hide the contents of a well known tale?"

"Arya frowned. "That means there's something very important that needs to be kept secret in that book. If it falls into the wrong hands, it could be dangerous." she said, snatching it back from Tyrion.

"Where are you in the tale?" Tyrion asked.

"The Queen has just flown back from the Wall to visit Winterfell and King Jaehaerys was waiting for her. Apparently her dragon wasn't too fond of the wall." she said.

"I don't blame her. It is a bit cold up there for a dragon." he said as they quietened once more. However, the look in Arya's eyes suggested she'd read something interesting. "What is it?" he asked.

Arya looked at him and he knew she was going to lie to him. "Just how friendly her dragon was, with humans and dragons. I just didn't expect that." she said.

Although Tyrion knew she was lying about what she had just read, he suspected she was telling the truth about dragon behaviour. "I think it depends upon how you view friendly. If not burning you to death or eating you is friendly, then they don't always kill you, especially if you are their rider or they can get something from you. I freed Rhaegal and Viserion from their shackles in Meereen and they didn't hurt me. They knew I was helping them and it wasn't in their interest to kill me. Dragons aren't stupid. They are probably more intelligent than we are." he said in the hope that he would get more from the book, but at least he knew where to find the information in the story as she had told him where she was prior to the look of surprise on her face.

The book Tyrion was reading, explained how the dragon eggs were secretly coated in moon tea every year, and how successive attempts to hatch them led to death and destruction, mainly of the Targaryens themselves, although the maesters knew why they weren't hatching, yet said nothing. Once upon a time there had been many people with Targaryen blood, yet now the only two Tyrion knew for certain had it running through their veins were Jon and Gendry. The tome explained how the maesters meticulously would paint the eggs with moon tea every full moon after they'd been placed in the cradle with the Targaryen babes, just to be sure. How the maesters would search Dragonstone whenever the dragons were away and paint the eggs. The tea was invisible and odourless, instead it seeped into the scales of the eggs and killed the baby inside, or if it wasn't done regularly the dragon was born malformed or stunted. If left too long, the eggs would hatch as normal. They had travelled to all of the known areas south of the neck where the dragons had visited searching for eggs, until eventually no more were found. Tyrion closed the book and sighed, it had been very informative, and it explained why the dragons died out and why it would have been kept hidden away. Tyrion put the book down and went to select another. As soon as he read the title, he started to laugh.

"What is it?" Arya frowned.

"The art of dragon bonding by Prince daemon Targaryen." he told her.

"Now that sounds more interesting." Arya yawned.

"Am I keeping you awake?" Tyrion asked.

Arya shook her head. "I'm just tired. It was a long journey and very little sleep. Even people like me need to rest." she said sarcastically. "Anyway, why would there be an art to dragon bonding? I thought the Targaryens just found a dragon and that was it."

"I believe there is more to it than that." Tyrion shook his head. "Riders only bond with one living dragon, take Daenerys, she could control three dragons, although she only ever rode one of them. I don't know of many others who were able to do such things. Then again she wasn't a normal Targaryen, fire didn't harm her unlike others of her kind. A red priestess believed Daenerys was Azor Ahai, the Prince that was Promised." he told her, to which he noted Arya looked at him with suspicion. "She was supposed to be the one to bring the end of the long night."

"But she didn't." Arya said. "I was the one who killed the Night King."

"Well, prophecies can be interpreted incorrectly." Tyrion explained. "But she mostly fit the description, there is no reason to think she wasn't."

"There is." Arya said. "I killed the Night King."

"As I once said to Ser Jorah Mormont 'Prophecy is like a half-trained mule. It looks as though it might be useful, but the moment you trust in it, it kicks you in the head.' in other words observe it, but don't chase it, because sometimes there are only half truths in it."

"Hmm." Arya frowned, looking decidedly uncomfortable. "What is the prophecy exactly?"

"Does it matter? The Night King is dead." Tyrion looked at Arya.

"What is it?" she demanded.

Tyrion rolled his eyes. "Once upon a time, a great warrior rose to fight the darkness which covered the land, his name was Azor Ahai. To fight he knew he needed to forge a special sword. However, when he went to temper it in water, the sword broke. He tried again, but this time he captured a lion and drove the sword into its heart to temper it, but once more the steel shattered. The third time, with a heavy heart, for he knew beforehand what he must do to finish the blade. This time, he called for his wife, Nissa Nissa and asked her to bare her breast. He drove his sword into her living heart, her soul combining with the steel of the sword, creating Lightbringer the Sword of Heroes which was always warm to the touch. The story goes Azor Ahai is to be reborn again after a long summer when an evil, cold darkness descends upon the world. It is said that again, Azor Ahai wielding Lightbringer, will stand against the darkness."

Arya took one look at Tyrion and burst into laughter. "What a load of bollocks. I don't see how that fits with Daenerys at all."

"There are other parts to the prophecy. The Prince that was Promised was said to be born amidst salt and smoke, beneath a bleeding star. The night Daenerys hatched the dragon eggs, a comet was seen in the sky, appearing as a bleeding star. She walked into the fire and people cried tears for her, which is the salt and smoke." Tyrion explained. "Or so I've heard."

"It's a stretch." Arya raised an eyebrow. "And what weapon did she use to not kill the Night King, the one who I killed instead? The prophecy must have been about me, otherwise it is either wrong or the long night hasn't truly started." she said. "Also, I don't think the Prince that was Promised is me. Other than killing the Night King, I don't fit any of the criteria and neither does Daenerys because she didn't kill him. Whoever it is, they are either still out there, or it is a load of rubbish." she said.

Tyrion was suspicious, he was beginning to wonder if Arya knew something about the prophecy which he didn't. She'd been searching Essos for answers to questions about the dagger, which meant she may have stumbled upon information he didn't have. He realised he needed to gain her trust. Not to report back to Bran, but to find out what was really going on for his own sanity because of late he was beginning to think Bran wasn't being honest with him and he wanted to know why and if his own life was in danger.

"Well as I said earlier, prophecies are vague and ambiguous. Never rely on what they say, and never chase prophecies. I suspect too many people have done so and died as a result." he warned, lifting the book up. "Back to our original subject, Daemon Targaryen. A man who had no special qualities, or any redeeming ones by the sounds of things, yet the dragons liked him. Why?" he asked.

Arya shook her head. "Maybe he smelled nice?" she said sarcastically.

"If it was that simple he wouldn't have written a book about it." Tyrion raised an eyebrow. "I know, to bond with a dragon you must smell of lemons. I don't think it worked like that."

"Why don't you just ask Jon?" Arya asked.

"I have every intention of asking your brother, or what he knows about it. But I would like to see what Prince Daemon has to say first. Maybe there is more than one way?" he shrugged.

"Why? Are you intending to bond with Drogon?" Arya laughed. "You're not a Targaryen."

"Just because I won't be able to use the ability for myself doesn't mean that having the knowledge isn't a powerful tool. Soon your sister is likely to be having Targaryen babes, so I think between us we ought to find some dragon eggs and discover how to bond them to the little ones." he smiled.

"You said they found all of the dragon eggs and painted them in moon tea." Arya said with a suspicious look on her face.

"I said they searched as far north as the neck. They only painted them as far east as Dragonstone and west as far as Lannisport. I do believe dragons can fly outside of those boundaries and have historically done so on many occasions. The book you are reading confirms my very theory. So unless they are lying in this book, there may well be many unhatched eggs waiting for a dragon rider to bond with them. There may even be dragons living out in the wild waiting to be tamed." Tyrion suggested. "We just need a list of the female dragons who we know flew to the places which weren't searched.

"Don't you think someone has already done that?" Arya asked.

"Possibly." Tyrion agreed. "I would be very surprised if there weren't dragon eggs in Old Valyria. Men with greyscale are the perfect bodyguards. Nobody would look there. They wouldn't look here in Winterfell would they?" he asked.

"What are you saying?" Arya raised an eyebrow.

"There are rumours that Vermax laid a clutch of dragon eggs in the Winterfell crypts when he came with Prince Jacaerys to treat with Cregan Stark." Tyrion suggested.

"Vermax was a male wasn't he?" Arya frowned.

"Do we know for certain? I believe it is difficult to sex a dragon. He could have been a she." Tyrion suggested.

"Maybe. But I've never heard anything of that tale, and I'm sure we'd know about it." Arya replied.

"What about your tale? The one with Queen Alysanne?" Tyrion asked. "Was her dragon male of female?"

"Female." Arya replied flatly.

"And what was her name?" Tyrion asked.

Arya took a deep breath. "Her name was Silverwing."

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