Daenerys and Quentyn were softly talking about taking an early supper and maybe spending the evening together when Missandei suddenly burst into her solar. There was a scroll in her hand, and the first thing that Daenerys noticed was that Missandei's eyes were ringed red, and she was a little pale. It wasn't like her first to show that kind of emotion in front of everyone, and Daenerys was on her feet in seconds. She was about to ask what was going on when Missandei handed her the scroll.
"Please, read it," Missandei whispered. Daenerys frowned as she took the scroll and looked at the seal. It was a Baratheon seal, but there was also the seal of Ser Davos, which was odd. He hadn't ever sent a raven before. Daenerys frowned as she took the scroll and slowly unwound it. It was a brief letter, and every single word made her blood run cold.
Your Grace, there has been an attack on your cousins. They did not survive their wounds. Come to Storm's End immediately. Ser Davos.
"Quentyn, Missandei, I need you both to make sure nothing happens, and no one knows why I'm leaving," Daenerys said. Quentyn frowned, but he also went extremely pale when he read the scroll that Daenerys handed him. She didn't stop to listen to hear what either of them had to say; she was too busy running. Daenerys didn't bother to change into a dress that would be better to travel in, she didn't take a crown, and the only reason she grabbed a cloak at all is because one was hanging on a hook as she ran out the Dragon Pit. Drogon looked up as soon as she ran outside and seemed to know that something was wrong. She could hear people yelling at her, but Daenerys didn't care about any of them. She climbed onto Drogon and took off into the sky.
She hadn't seen any of her cousins in quite some time. Daenerys remembered making the trip to Storm's End after she heard about how the bastard blacksmith of Storm's End was charging the noble's of Westeros what Daenerys thought were extremely fair princes considering the work that Gendry put into his pieces. She didn't know how to help him, she didn't know what to say to him, and when he told her that her words were meaningless and all but threw her out of his forge, Daenerys didn't know what to say. Her two guards were waiting outside, but Daenerys was surprised to see Mya waiting for her as well.
Mya's black hair had gotten a little longer and now fell down to her chin. She was wearing a gold and black long tunic and black leggings with knee-high boots. Her arms were crossed, and she didn't look particularly impressed to see Daenerys here. In truth, she hadn't given Edric or any of the much warning that she was coming to visit.
"Did he throw you out?" Mya asked.
"More or less," Daenerys replied as she walked over to Mya. "I want to fix this for him, for both of them, but I do not know how to do that without half of the Lesser Houses of Westeros rebelling against us."
"He understands why you can't do anything on a pure logic level the same way he understands that we can't smuggle him into the North to the Free Cities because it would trigger an uprising here in the Stormlands," Mya said. "But he's not thinking logically, Dany, and you know that. You can't come here and beg for his forgiveness because he won't give it to you. He just isn't capable of doing that right now."
"I just wanted to make sure he was safe," Daenerys said. "He's family, you're all family, and I wanted to look out for him."
"I am looking out for him just fine," Mya said, and her voice was harder than Daenerys had ever heard her. "Dany, Your Grace, we always appreciate seeing you here in Storm's End, but I speak on behalf of my siblings that we would not appreciate any more visits like this. It took us weeks to get him to function again, and seeing you here could set him back. You say you want to look out for him? Do it from a distance." Mya turned and walked away without another word. Daenerys watched her go and left not soon after. She knew when she wasn't wanted, and right now, Storm's End was not a place that wanted to see her. Daenerys knew that it was going to be strictly business between her and her cousins for the time being. At the time, she prayed that there would be some form of reconciliation in the future.
As she rode Drogon as fast as she could toward Storm's End, Daenerys hated herself for walking away from family so willingly. The raven from Davos had to be wrong. There was no way her cousins, her kin, were gone from this world. There was no way it was just her and Jon left, and Jon was someone whom she couldn't see as well. The high tower of Storm's End appeared, and Daenerys guided Drogon to the ground. The people looked surprised to see her, which meant that there was a good chance that they didn't know what had happened. Davos was waiting for her at the front gate, and if she didn't know him so well, Daenerys never would have guessed that something was wrong. He was stoic, but his eyes were ringed red, and he looked incredibly pale. She didn't want to cause panic in Storm's End, not right now, and she forced herself to smile warmly when she saw Davos.
"Ser Davos, as always, it's wonderful to see you," she said.
"And you, Your Grace. Please, come with me," Davos said, and he leads her to the castle without another word. The castle was almost completely empty save for a few guards that looked uncomfortable. Davos brought her to one of the lower rooms in the castle and opened a door. The smell was the first time that struck her. Daenerys spent a lot of time around dead bodies, and she knew what a body that had spent days rotting in the sun smelled like. That was the smell that hit her when that door opened, which didn't make any sense. It had been a little over a day since the attack, and nobody rotted that quickly.
There were four bodies laid out on the slabs in front of her, and Daenerys tried to keep herself under control as she took a step forward. The clothes were all ones that she recognized, and there was even soot on Gendry's hands. However, their clothing was the only thing that she could recognize. Their faces had been mutilated terribly, and all of the skin appeared to be rotting off. She heard about the poison that did this to bodies when she heard about The Mountain and what killed him. All four of her cousins were terribly poisoned and mutilated to the point that they are hardly human anymore. The hair, the clothing, the body types were all consistent with her family.
"Are you sure it's-" Daenerys whispered.
"Our Maester was the only one who was able to get close to their bodies without vomiting, and even then it's a close call," Davos said, and his voice was flat and dead. "He checked them for the birthmarks that Bella and Edric both have and confirmed that it is them. The scars on Gendry's body from the war and the marks on Mya's feet from her many years leading men up the Vale were all present according to the maester. Those are the clothes they were wearing the last time I saw them; it's them." The smell was terrible, but she took a step forward and reached out to touch Gendry's hair or something when Davos stopped her. "I wouldn't, Your Grace, they are covered in the poison, and we don't want it to get on you."
"I wanted to-" Daenerys cut herself off and didn't know what exactly she wanted to do. Her eyes were burning from unshed tears, and the fact that the smell was terrible. It was the respectful thing to do, to sit with her family, but she couldn't. Davos seemed to understand what she was going through and led her out of the room. Daenerys wasn't really paying attention and realized that Davos had taken her to the Round Hall. There was what appeared to be a cold meal laid out that no one had touched. "What happened?" she whispered.
"We're not exactly sure," Davos replied as he poured a glass of wine and handed it to her. "The last anyone saw any of them, Gendry was leaving his forge to have a late-night meal and chat with Edric, Mya, and Bella. The maid found them the next morning like that, and the guard at the door was also dead." Davos curled in on himself a little. "I've seen a lot, Dany, a lot of terrible things, but I've never seen people killed like that. I've never seen so much malice put into cutting out the pieces of other human beings." Daenerys reached forward and took Davos' hand. He held on tight and was nearly crushing her fingers, but she refused to say anything about it. "I was given a second chance to protect this House and those young people, and I failed them just like I failed Shireen. I didn't protect them."
"Davos, this isn't your fault. They all loved you, and they spoke so highly of you all the time. Edric told me that he couldn't imagine trying to run Storm's End without you here. You and your wife cared for my cousins when they didn't have any other family to look after them," Daenerys said as she closed her eyes. "They died loving you."
"But they didn't hate you," Davos said, following her line of thinking, but Daenerys closed her eyes because she couldn't believe that. "I really did try to look out for them the same way you did, but I was never very good at it. Not long ago, a young man came to me telling me that he was essentially spying on them even though I never told anyone to do that. He told me that Edric was trying to smuggle something to the Ironborn from Storm's End and that I needed to stop it because the Ironborn were going North. I yelled at the man and told him that he isn't ever to spy on my cousins again. Then I made sure that the rings because I knew it was Sansa and Theon's weddings from Gendry, made their way North. I wanted that for all of them." Daenerys' visions blurred as the tears began to fall from her eyes. "Arya is never going to forgive me for this."
"I imagine the Princess Arya isn't going to forgive the entire world for taking Gendry away from her, let alone you specifically," Davos said. The two of them sat alone in the round hall for a long time and silently cried. Eventually, he guided her to a room where she could sleep, and Daenerys spent a long time staring at the ceiling. Gendry, Edric, Mya, and Bella were all extremely dear to her heart no matter what anyone said. There were those that said they were threats to her rule, but Daenerys knew that they never wanted any of this. It took some convincing to have them run the Stormlands. They were natural leaders, and the Stormlands were going to be worse off without their guiding hands. They would have to track down Edric's will eventually, but Davos was the only person that she could see Edric appointing as his heir to run Storm's End if the worst should happen.
Daenerys closed her eyes and thought about Arya, about Sansa and Jon and Bran and Meera, and all of the Stark's up the North. Jon would fight and maintain peace for the greater good, but Daenerys knew that she had lost her family up in the North as well. They wouldn't welcome her back, not again, and now she was as alone as she had ever been. Missandei and Quentyn were there, and they were kin now, but there was something about the blood relationships she had with her cousins and with Jon that she treasured. Their kind hearts were proof that there was more to Targaryen blood than their madness.
She didn't sleep for a long time, and the sun was rising by the time her eyes closed. Daenerys knew that she only slept for a few hours, but she knew that she wanted to sit with the bodies of her cousins some more. It was the right thing to do even if the poison made the smell unbearable. Her dress was a little wrinkled, but Daenerys didn't care. The castle was still mostly asleep, and her guards walked her to the room where the bodies were being kept. Daenerys was surprised to see the door open, and four coffins were sitting in the room instead of four bodies. The Maester of Storm's End, an older man in his fifties, looked up at her.
"Your Grace, what are you doing here?" he asked.
"I wanted to sit with my cousins, are they already entombed?" Daenerys asked, and the maester winced.
"I'm afraid so, Your Grace," he said. "The poison was essentially ruining their bodies, and the longer we left them out of coffins, the more dangerous their bodies would become." The maester looked at the coffins sadly. "There is nothing I could do for them, so I don't believe that any funeral that shows their bodies was the right thing to do."
"No, they don't deserve to be remembered like that," Daenerys whispered as she placed a hand on the coffin and closed her eyes. If she listened hard enough, she could hear the last time she was at Storm's End, and everyone was happy. She had gone for a visit not long after putting Edric in power, and the four of them spent the night drinking wine and laughing together. Bella told jokes that would make any man blush, Mya made sure they drank water, so no one was hungover, and Edric was proud as he talked about the first noble he had threatened if they didn't take care of the smallfolk. She knew they were going to be great leaders, and she remembered wanting them to live long lives to bring honor back to the Baratheon name.
None of this was fair.
"Your Grace?" the maester asked, and Daenerys opened her eyes.
"Thank you for looking out for them and trying to save them," she said, and the maester bowed. Daenerys walked through Storm's End and found Davos waiting for her at the top of the stairs. He looked like he was about to go down as well and was trying to stop himself. "The maester has already moved their bodies into coffins." Davos pressed his lips together, and Daenerys could see that he was very much trying to keep himself together right now.
"I didn't ask him to do that yet," he said.
"The way the maester explained it to me is that the poison and everything else could make them dangerous if they weren't sealed away," Daenerys replied. The two of them stood in silence for a moment and then made their way up to Edric's solar together. There were several bloodstains on the carpet that looked like someone had tried to clean them, but there was a chance that they wouldn't ever come up. It seemed that they were both going to ignore that part of the situation right now. "We need to find Edric's will to make it official, but I can only assume that he would have you run Storm's End should the worst happen to him. I can help make that transition as we make the announcement to the people."
"I already called for an official notice, but we need to send out a raven to Arya first. The last thing we need is for the news to reach Winterfell through a merchant before she hears from us," Davos replied. The two of them sat down and tried to come up with the words that could explain what happened. In the end, they decided to each send a letter to explain what was going on. Daenerys took it upon herself to explain that all of the Baratheon's were dead, but she paused when she was about to explain what had happened.
"It was violent," Daenerys whispered, and Davos looked up at her. "I've seen assassinations, as have you, but they aren't like that. People are poisoned or have their throat slit in their beds. This was violent and slow and painful in a way that I've never seen before."
"You don't think it was political?" Davos asked.
"I think whoever did this was angry, and we need to keep that in mind as we look for the person or people responsible. I hesitate to call it an assassination because of the level of violence. Assassinations are usually clean, and this wasn't," she said.
"They were murdered, and the first thing I intend to do as the Lord of Storm's End is bring justice for House Baratheon," Davos said. He sounded angry and dangerous, which was not something she associated with Davos. He was an older man that seemed to luck his way around his ranking members of Westeros because he was a good man that provided excellent guidance. She knew that he would be a good leader, and Edric wouldn't have appointed him if he didn't, but Daenerys knew he was going to tear the world apart until there was justice, and she saw no need to stop him.
They finished sending out the ravens and went out to make the announcement to the people of Storm's End. The maester helped them send out ravens to all of the Lesser Houses in the Stormlands, and Daenerys stood before the people and told them how they had lost their Baratheon leaders yet again. This time there was an immediate reaction from the people as they wailed and cried. Her cousins were so well-loved by the people, and it broke her heart to see them so sad. She told them that Ser Davos would guide them well and that anyone Edric put his faith in was a good man. They all seemed to know Davos and trusted.
Davos took a step forward and promised justice for the last members of House Baratheon, and the people cheered. Daenerys tried not to think about the four coffins beneath the castle and how she had to send out ravens to the Great Houses, so they knew what was going on as well. She tried not to think about how she lost more family and that all of her cousins were gone.
Gendry wasn't expecting to open his eyes again. When the blade slid into his back, and he lay there on the floor of Edric's solar, he thought this was it. Yet he wasn't dead, and there was a considerable amount of pain from said stab wound to his back. It was like fighting against a deep ocean as he struggled to pull himself back to the surface, and he was exhausted by the time he managed to open his eyes. The first thing Gendry noticed was that the floor was moving. At first, he thought that he was just dizzy from blood loss, but he could hear waves crashing. He was on a boat. He tried to move and realized there were heavy chains around his wrists and ankles.
He nearly passed out again the first time he tried to sit up, and the second time Gendry had to keep himself from throwing up. He was in a dark room under a ship, and they were sailing. There was one small window letting in the sunlight, and he had no idea how much time had passed. Gendry's eyes adjusted, and he realized that he wasn't alone; Mya, Bella, and Edric were all in the room with him. Despite the fact that he nearly bit through his tongue Gendry managed to get to all of them. They were all wounded, locked in chains, but they were alive.
Gendry collapsed back down, the little bit of moving he did taking all of his energy and tried to take stock about where he was. He was in a boat with his siblings, they were all wounded but alive, and Gendry had no idea where they were going, who had taken them, or why.
Gendry closed his eyes and let the darkness take him and those unanswered questions down with him.
