Near the ruins of Old Valyria…
Scouring the ruins of the once-great civilization of the Valyrian Freehold, Jon Connington traded occasional glances of his surroundings. Valyria was once the mightiest empire in the world before its destruction 400 years ago in a catastrophic volcanic event known as the Doom which utterly wiped out the capital city of Old Valyria and the Valyrian Peninsula's surrounding colonies as well as almost all their dragons in a single day. Every recorded history and knowledge was lost that day.
Although the ruins remained albeit with slight crumbling eroding stones, the former Lord of Griffon's Roost knew he mustn't remain lingering about in the territory for much longer. The ruins of Valyria had become overgrown and subsumed by a nearby jungle which was an extent even greater than Harrenhal. Those who ventured into Old Valyria in the pursuit of seeking lost treasure were never seen or heard from ever again… and there were reported sightings of Stone Men dwelling in the area. As such, Jon—a seasoned combat veteran—knew he had to be extremely careful.
"Blasted pile of rubble," he grumbled under his breath.
A large bank of fog began rolling in the more he ventured inward. Brushing branches out of his way, Jon approached his destined location where he was to supposedly meet with an old contact of his. Connington heard rustling noises and brought his hand to his side, grasping the handle of his blade; but a sound emanating from above momentarily breaks his concentration.
*RRROOOOOOOAAAAAAA!*
Jon looked up and, to his surprise, noticed Daenerys' missing dragon Drogon flying overhead. Massive and majestic, Drogon's unexpected appearance enraptured Connington.
"There you are. Black and red scales with red-black wings," he mused. "Traveling north by northeast; Daenerys will no doubt be pleased to know you were here…"
"Only you won't be the one reporting back to her."
Turning around to respond to the intruder, Jon was surprised to see none other than the disgraced Ser Jorah Mormont appearing from out beneath the underbrush; no longer did the exiled Northmen lord wear steal and leather armor made for combat, but Jorah's attire consisted of a tattered yellow shirt, blue neck scarf, drawstring pants, six braided leather arm wraps and a grayish-brown waistcoat.
"Jorah Mormont."
"Jon Connington."
Both men sized each other up; they hadn't seen each other in about two years after Connington revealed Jorah to be a spy for the Usurper Robert Baratheon to Daenerys and a traitor the Targaryen cause back in Astapor—a revelation that not only caused the exiled Westerosi to not only lose the Dragon Queen's favor but also to be banished from her service. Since then, Jorah searched endlessly for a way to regain his khaleesi's favor.
"I half expected to find Black Balaq or Duck, but not you. Never thought I'd find you here near the Smoking Sea surrounding the ruins of Valyria."
Jorah stood tall and firm. "And I had not expected to see you here as well, but I haven't forgotten how you shamed me the way you did."
"And for that you blame me for your own doing? If so then you are even more deluded than I thought, Mormont. Fitting that you meet your end here," he scoffed as he unsheathed in sword.
Sensing danger, Jorah unsheathed his blade in preparations for a fight. Both veterans eyed each other, one measuring the other… the griffon of Griffon's Roost and the bear of Bear Island readied themselves for battle.
"You'll find I'm not that easy to take down," Mormont retorted.
And within that moment, both Jon and Jorah lunged forth. Trading blow after blow, steel clashed and dashed violently; the griffon and the bear were both equally seasoned veterans in their own right, neither one landing a decisive blow on the other. As Ser Jorah thrusted his blade forward, Connington sidestepped and swung around but Mormont ducked before dropping to his knees to strike at Jon's feet. Connington dodged by jumping over it. Both disgraced Westerosi exiles reverted back to square one with their blades drawn and pointed at each other.
"You're pretty good in a fight, Mormont," Jon complimented dryly. "But what you have is still not enough to best me."
"And yet here I stand, Connington."
"Ah yes, the words of House Mormont; one that speaks of perseverance and difficulties that shape the men and women of Bear Island in times of hardship."
"It also symbolizes our unwavering dedication to our allies and loved ones," Jorah explained.
"How ironic considering you spied on Daenerys for the Usurper."
Jorah frowned. "I severed all ties as soon as I saw her walk through the flames unharmed! I came to believe in her then… as I've come to believe in her now. And if that means I have to carve my way back to our khaleesi's side, then I'll fight to the end!"
"A fierce foe, a faithful friend," Jon recited his house motto. "You've had your chance to be a faithful servant of House Targaryen and you chose to waste it by not saying not being honest with yourself!"
Resuming the fight, Connington and Mormont battled fiercely in the fog, muddy terrain and near steamy streams. Steel strained against steel, both men strained against each other's constant pressuring—neither of them giving any ground. Jon and Jorah were nearly as experienced as the other and were just as aged.
*SPLASH!*
Perking up their ears at the sound of loud splashing, Connington and Mormont ceased their duel and broke off to see ripples in the water as several humanoid silhouettes dropped down before vanishing; both men's senses were on high alert.
"What was that?"
"Shh! I saw something move."
"Check the water—"
As both veterans remained on guard trying to search through the fog, numerous assailants leapt out of the water and lunged at their targets; the men attacking looked as if their skin was dead, hard and cracked like stone.
"*Haaauuf! Haaah!*"
"Stone Men! Don't let them touch you!" Jorah called out.
Jon smacked one aside with the back of his pommel. "Defensive formation! Get behind me!" he shouted.
Often shunned from society, people severely afflicted with greyscale are exiled from their homelands to the ruins of cities in Essos, particularly Old Valyria, at the first sign of the disease. As such, greyscale has caused its victims to become witless and lumbering, generally passive if left undisturbed, though further onset of the disease leads to madness and increased risk of provocation. Physical contact with Stone Men bears a high risk of contracting greyscale, so they are treated with great caution. What the victims do with their final months of years, no one knows and no one wants to find out.
"*Snaarl! Grraugh!"*
"Back, you mindless beasts!" Connington roared, thrusting his longsword through one of their hearts.
Shoulder-to-shoulder, back-to-back… the former combatants now cooperate with each other in a desperate fight for survival as more Stone Men came pouring from the water and undergrowth, wails shivering through the fog—faint and high. Outnumbered, Jon and Jorah moved from the swamps to the upper hills in the pursuit of gaining the high ground. The Stone Men occasionally tripped and stumbled over each other during the chase up the hill, but they still kept on coming.
Mormont raised his longsword and shoved away another stone man, watching the greyscale humanoid slide down the hill and into the fog below.
*"Gaauh! Huuuaaa!*"
"Gah! They're everywhere!"
"We can't stay here! Fall back!"
Jorah felled another stone man, bringing his blade down on the shoulder but gets stuck in the ribcage as a third moved towards him—only a mere inches away. Connington held the flat end of his sword to keep him at bay before driving a dagger into its eye. Spotting a nearby paddle long since abandoned by pirates or treasure hunters, Mormont picked it up swung his pole, slamming it into another stone man's chest and watched as it sent him tumbling down the hill into the river where he sank at once.
Connington drove another creature backwards as soon as his feet felt the terrain transition from steep hill to a flat surface, indicating that both men had reached the top. When the stone men moved aft, Connington blocked the way as Mormont flashed his blade, a spark flying where the steel bit into the stone man's calcified grey flesh and kicked the limb aside. Together the griffon and bear forced the creatures down the hill and into the black waters of the Rhoyne. By then, both were worn out and sought to catch their breaths.
"Seven fucking hells," Jon panted faintly. "Never… *huff!* coming back here *huff!* again!"
Jorah was already on one knee. "Did… *huff!* did any of them touch you?"
"Why should you be concerned?"
"If any of us contracted greyscale, then we'd meet the same fate as those sods."
Jon looked up, noticing the sun beginning to set. "Best find someplace a lot safer than here, Mormont. I'd rather kill you here and call it a day, but Valyria is not fit as a battle arena for any combatant."
"The feeling is mutual," Jorah grumbled.
"Just to be clear: this does not make us allies. The Dragon Queen will not see you again."
"Well guess what, Connington? That's no longer up to you."
"Oh?" Jon raised an eyebrow daringly. "And why is that?"
Jorah looks at Jon's arm and points. "Look."
The once Lord of Griffon's Roost and Hand of the King glanced down and shrugged off his wolfskin cloak, slipped his mail shirt off over his head, settled on a camp stool, and peeled the glove from his right hand. The nail on his middle finger had turned as black as jet, he saw, and the grey had crept up almost to the first knuckle. The tip of his ring finger had begun to darken too, and when he touched it with the point of his dagger, he felt nothing.
"You've been infected," he said simply.
"A slow death," Jon murmured. 'I still have time. One year, perhaps, maybe two or five if I'm lucky. Some stone men live for ten. Hopefully that'll be more than enough time to cross the Narrow Sea, to see my home Griffin's Roost again. To end the Usurper's line for good and all, and put my dearest friend Rhaegar's sister upon the Iron Throne.' Connington glanced at Jorah in a near similar fashion. "The same could be said of you. Lift up your sleeve."
Jorah's brow lowered and he frowned, but begrudgingly pulled up his sleeve and expressed a mix of surprise and horror. Mormont examines his arm and notices the beginnings of greyscale on his wrist. After a moment, both the griffon and bear looked at one another.
"Seems we'll both end up sharing the same fate."
Jon shook his head. "Not if I had anything to say about it."
Before Ser Jorah could respond, Connington quickly approached and hit Mormont in the back of the head with the paddle the bear had just thrown down, rendering him unconscious. Jon looked down at the motionless Mormont, before reaching into his pelt and unveiling a long rope.
"You'll be coming with me back to Meereen, Mormont. Daenerys Targaryen will decide your fate… We'll see whether or not she'll forgive you and take us both back home. I owe my cherished friend that much."
As Jon slung the unconscious Jorah onto a raft, he felt somewhat somber.
"I've no plans on wasting more years living in exile," he grumbled as he took out a small knife and pressed it against his flesh. "And I have no intention of losing myself to this disease."
In Meereen…
Strolling through the streets of Meereen, Queens Saqnizza Dhardu and Daenerys Targaryen were in the middle of a heated argument of ideology.
"You plan on letting your people butcher each other for sport? Where slaves fought other slaves to the death?" Daenerys accused.
Saqnizza angrily waived her finger. "Free men fight free men, Daenerys Stormborn," she corrected her. "Look around you: none of us are in chains, no longer slaves. The Great Pit of Daznak will be open again in accordance to the traditional start of the fighting season."
"I do not respect this tradition of human cockfighting."
"Of course you don't because you don't even bother to understand us! I will not allow a foreign outsider to dictate the terms of what the people of Meereen should or shouldn't do nor should the pitfighters be left to fend for themselves, left out in the cold on the streets if not forgotten about."
"You were sold into slavery, Saqnizza, forced to fight to the death for the amusement of the masters, and you're defending the fighting pits?"
"I didn't get to be the so-called 'revolutionary leader of a slave rebellion' without getting my hands bloody," she retorted. "Every martial prowess I learned I learned at the fighting pits. Our children and their descendants will train there and become Meereen's greatest defenders."
Daenerys frowned. "An army of child fighters."
"Don't you even think about going there! You want to know how to rule? Sometimes we have to compromise whether we like it or not. And you will remember this: you're a guest in someone else's home. One wrong misstep, and you and your followers will find yourselves out on the streets."
The Dragon Queen was vocally opposed to the reopening of Meereen's fighting pits, but no matter how much she protested it was ultimately Saqnizza's decision to make. As the Unsullied and Meereenese City Guard patrolled the streets, there still remained a deal of mistrust lingering between them.
"I say open the fighting pits," suggested Daario.
Saqnizza blinked in surprise and Daenerys stared at him.
"What?"
"My mother was a whore, I told you that," he explained. "So one day when I was 12, she sold me to a slaver she fucked the night before. I wasn't big, but I was quick. And I loved to fight. So they sold me to a man in Tolos who trained fighters for the pits. I had my first match when I was 16. I'm only here because of those pits."
A long pause hovered between them.
"And you remember you all live in my home as guests by my leave?" Saqnizza asked. "That we haven't asked anything should you agree to uphold the agreement we've made?"
Daario nodded. "You're the Queen. Meereen knows who leads them," he turns to Daenerys, "and who makes thousands of enemies across the world. As soon as they see weaknesses, they'll attack."
"That's why I have the Unsullied assist the Meereenese City Guard in patrolling the streets," Daenerys points out.
"Anyone with a chest full of gold can buy an army of Unsullied. You're not the Mother of Unsullied. You're the Mother of Dragons."
Saqnizza glared at him. "And need I remind you both that one of your dragons attacked our livestock and murdered helpless children? My people's children?"
Daenerys frowned; she hadn't forgotten the memory of what had occurred last year. A farmer Goatherd approached Queen Saqnizza about Daenerys' dragon Drogon and carried a bundle of small bones charred on the ends. And a little skull. A child's remains. Daenerys remembered how mournfully Goathered wept for the loss of his daughter as Missandei translated his language to her. She had also remembered the next day how explicitly furious Saqnizza was with Daenerys as soon as the rebel queen discovered of the incident… and the threat.
"You've got a lot of nerve thinking your beasts can do whatever they want in my city!" she yelled at her with such heat. "This is my home, not yours! If you can't keep your savage beasts under control, then I'll have every Meereen storm the catacombs and slaughter them for every innocent blood they've spilled!"
It didn't take long for Daenerys Targaryen to feel threatened or intimidated, but what other options did she have? She couldn't find Drogon and had no idea where he was, but with tears in her eyes she had to confine the other two Rhaegal and Viserion to the catacombs. They've grown larger and powerful, but Daenerys still thought of them as her children even as she snapped collars around their necks whilst they fed on goats.
Nor had she forgotten as she closed the catacomb double doors Rhaegal and Viserion realized something was wrong and cried out to their 'mother' for help.
That did little to ease tensions. But…
"AAaaah!"
Saqnizza, Daenerys and Daario turned their heads to the scream as the city bells began ringing. Instinctively, the rebel queen turned to her guests.
"Get back to the pyramid," she told them. "We'll talk more later."
As Daario escorted a confused Daenerys back to her guest quarters in the Great Pyramid, Saqnizza unsheathed her twin daggers from her waist and rushed off to investigate. The Unsullied, Meereenese City Guards alike all rushed to the area where they find dead soldiers and a few prostitutes in a nearby alley.
"Skoros sepār massitas kesīr (What just happened here)?" the rebel Queen asked them.
One of the guards shook his head. "Īlon ȳdra daor gīmigon, ñuha dāria. (We don't know, my Queen)."
A freedman witness spoke up. "Pōnta're kesīr! (They're here!)" he told them. "Jaelzi naejot dīnagon iā collar arlī va ñuha ȳrgos! (They want to put a collar back on my neck!)"
"Qilōni iksis trying naejot dīnagon iā collar va aōha ȳrgos? (Who is trying to put a collar on your neck?)"
"Pōnta brōzagon pōntāla se Trēsi hen Jazdanī. (They call themselves the Sons of the Harpy)."
Saqnizza furrowed her brow and gripped her daggers tightly. The only evidence they managed to find was a gold mask with horned faces resembling harpies. Another scream in the distance breaks their attention, attracting some Unsullied marching to investigate. Hearing more chaos erupting throughout the streets, Saqnizza calls for her guards.
"Va nyke! Mīsagon se ābra! (On me! Protect the civilians!)" she hollered.
A prostitute nearby gestures them in a direction where Queen Saqnizza and the Unsullied run into. When they are out of view, she stops her act and wipes the tears away. The Unsullied enter a corridor, expecting to catch the sons. Instead, they themselves are ambushed from every direction by Sons of the Harpy.
"Ziry iksos iā nykeā! (It's a trap!)" Saqnizza realized. "Tolvys, ivīlībagon aōha ābrar! Ivīlībagon iā dāez Mīrīn! (Everyone, fight for your lives! Fight for a free Meereen!)"
"Syt Mīrīn! (For Meereen!)"
After a tense few moments, a fight breaks out. During the fight, one of the Unsullied's helmet is knocked off, and is revealed to be Grey Worm. Another fight breaks out elsewhere. The two Unsullied there are killed almost immediately. Saqnizza takes out her fair share of assassins, though not without receiving her share of wounds and remaining outnumbered. Grey Worm is badly injured, and with his party killed, also badly outnumbered.
Fighting with every ounce of strength and willpower, Saqnizza and Grey Worm continue holding off the Sons of the Harpy and are able to kill several them, but are both seriously injured in the process.
"Gaah!" the rebel Queen screams in pain as one of the Sons of the Harpy assailant plunges a dagger into her back before another impales her through the gut.
Her strength leaving her, Saqnizza drops her twin daggers. Before the Sons of the Harpy could finish her deliver the final blow, Grey Worm slays the remaining assassins as they release their grip on the rebel Queen. Slumping to the ground, Grey Worm crawls his way up to the fallen Saqnizza and shakes her to look for signs of life before passing out of exhaustion. Surrounded by piles of the dead Sons of the Harpy, city guard and Unsullied, the following morning would usher in a new stage of chaos… and the loss of a revolutionary icon among the former slaves-turned-freed men.
Chapter End
Author's Note: Trouble seems to follow certain major characters in Game of Thrones; as Jon Connington and Jorah Mormont came to blows before fending off an attack from stone men near the ruins of Old Valyria, Saqnizza's forces come face-to-face with the Sons of the Harpy—only these insurgents are opposed to Daenerys presence in Meereen, but they also oppose Saqnizza herself for her role in leading the revolution which ousted the slavers' rule over the area. Think each individual group of people will eventually find common ground with one another before things escalate too quickly? Thoughts? Let me know.
Silent Wolf Singer: I haven't read the books, but in the show the archmaester told Jorah he should had cut his arm off , remove the effected area to save his life. If Jon finger tip was infected, couldn't he cut it off and survive? Just a curious question. Good chapter by the way
―Chances would still be 50/50 either way even if Jon did manage to cut off whatever part of him was infected with greyscale since it could occur in other parts of the body as well. Even so, anything's possible.
mpowers045: I don't like the idea of human cockfighting but entertainment is what public order needs so as long they are like free men fighting for like a prize money or something, then it will work
C.E.W: Great so now Jon Connington is bringing Jorah to Daenerys. And Daenerys and Saqnizza were at each other's throats about the fighting pits. The Sons of the Harpy's attack on has just give them a reason to unite against them. Sorry didn't see the death of Saqnizza, not that the Queen of Meereen is murdered, the people will turn against the Sons of the Harpy and give strength to Daenerys' cause.
The Three Stoogies: A great chapter like always so now Danny becomes the soul ruler of merren can't wait to read more
DaddyChad: And Daenerys has enough power to seize control of Meereen with the death of their Queen
RHatch89: Awesome update :)
―Thanks.