Author's Notes: So to be honest, I'm tired of updating this story without any development in the reviews and readers side. Last few chapters were really hard to write and it was much harder to see them getting no actual recognition. So I've made my mind as to update this story further only if someone is willing. Leave a comment, say about it.
Andrew
The last night fell black and moonless, but for once the sky was clear. The grey fogs had given way to endless pits of dark which filled the world.
So many stars, he thought as he watched up the sky from the window of the forsaken wooden cabin. His mother had taught him his stars as a boy in Winterfell; he had learned the names of the twelve houses of heaven and the rulers of each; he could find the seven wanderers sacred to the Faith; he was old friends with the Ice Dragon, the Shadowcat, the Moonmaid, and the Sword of the Morning. All those he shared with the Braavosi, but not some of the others. We look up at the same stars, and see such different things. The King's Crown was the Cradle, to hear the Moonsingers tell it; the Stallion was the Horned Lord; the red wanderer that septons preached was sacred to their Smith up here was called the Red Lord. And when the Red Lord was in the Cradle, that was a propitious time to overcome all the evil, dark and terror that wanders this world, the red priests of R'hllor insisted. Is that true? he wondered. The world had never really been truly kind to him. For all he knew evil and terror always ruled this world whether the Red Lord was bright in the Cradle or not. Even if it had been true it was for them, not for me. He never truly belonged with them, never belonged here.
Though there were too many stars in the black night sky there was no mistaking his family, his father and mother. He found them just as easily as he could find the moon on a starry night and the sun on a cloudy day. There to the north, low and deep in the western horizon lived his family, the three stars twinkling in a straight line, lightly slanting to one side in the sky. His father was in the bottom end, big and steady looking as strong as always. His mother was at the top, bright and lively as always. Never has he seen someone or something brighter or lovelier than her. And there between them was little Andrew, a small blue star between the big star and the bright star, his father and his mother. He remembered a night sitting with his mother and father in the godswood of Winterfell looking at the stars. His mother was telling him about the stars. Andrew had been so afraid of being lonely that day after venturing into the cold crypts of Winterfell all alone. "Mama, you won't leave me alone will you?" He asked his mother. His mother held him close to her and pressed kisses to his cheeks. "Never," she had said pressing kisses all over his face. "If you ever felt lonely, Andrew, look up at them." She pointed at the three stars. "There is Mama," she pointed at mother. "And there is Papa," she pointed at father. "And there between us you are. My little Star-Lord." she pointed at little Andrew. "We will always be with you, Andrew. We will always be looking after you." His mother kissed his nose then making him laugh. He could almost feel how warm her kisses had been, how warm she had been. A mother's warmth. Andrew would gladly spend a cold night in the arms of his mother rather than warming up in the hot springs of Winterfell's godswood. There was no warmth for him now. My little Star-Lord, Lady Ashara Dayne had liked to call him. I am not even her little boy anymore. He had been three when his mother told him about his family. Thirteen years have passed and little Andrew stayed little while he grew.
"Are you looking at me now mother?" Andrew asked his mother. He turned to his father. "You father? Are you looking at me now?" He got no answers. "Look at me now," he told them, "Look at me kill him."
Andrew moved back from the windows and his parents. He had fastened the shutters back so as to keep a clear eye in everything happening outside. He had waited eleven years to make this happen and didn't want to miss it now that the opportunity has fallen into his hands. But there was nothing happening outside the window of Andrew's little room, only a wall of shifting grey fog. The air had grown chilly... and a good thing, else he might have fallen asleep. It would be just like Andrew to sleep through his own chance for justice. Killing Viserys had been an easy job to do. Instead of Andrew doing most of the works the Mad Dragon himself gave all the chances he had wanted and paid for it with his life. He knew that hunting down Rhaegar won't be as easy as Viserys. If the man was anything better than Viserys he would keep his guards close, and finish his work without any delay and return back to the safety of his castle.
Andrew had never wanted to take any chances to let him slip past his hands. Ballos had informed him about the King's visit to Braavos and ever since he was troubling over it. He sat against the wall and buried his head in his hands. Why am I so angry? he asked himself, but it was a stupid question. He is your family's killer. He killed your father, your mother, your uncle and a hundred other innocent men. You have every right to be angry at him.
On the day he had dealt with Viserys, his family had been with him. His mother, his father, uncle Arthur, uncle Aaron. Today it was not Lord Eddard's face he saw floating before him, or Lady Ashara's or Ser Arthur Dayne, though; it was Rhaegar's face. With his deep purple eyes and a meloncholic smile, he looked a bit like a good, kind man. A mask, he thought, he is naught but wearing a mask. He was looking at him the way he had looked at him at Starfall, when he had murdered his family. You are next? that look had always seemed to say. After them, it's your time.
Illola and her daughters were looking after the inn after Andrew had left them yestermorn. He knew that Rhaegar would never give him much of a chance like Viserys and he chose to use every chance he could get. He knew that the Sea Lord and the other nobles of the free city of Braavos would personally come to meet with the King of the Seven Kingdoms and that would give him a chance. It might be hard to get near him but Andrew hoped to end him during the pleasantries. He had made his lair in a little room at the top of a leaning three-storeyed building overlooking the Purple Harbor. He had a good vantage point and a good view of the colored platform made to welcome the King of the Seven Kingdoms. Across the cobbled stone street than ran beneath his building he could see the green water of the little canal below, two arches of the mossy bridges. On other days Braavos would be lost in fogs but that day it seemed clear enough to see the far end of the bridge through the greyness, and of the vague lights of the buildings across the canal.
Andrew leaned against the wall and took up his longbow, bending the smooth thick Dornish yew to slip a bowstring through the notches. He had got the longbow from a sellsword who had just made his way back from Westeros. During his time in the foghouse, the man used to sing songs of how lovely and deadly his bow was. He also talked of how lucky the bow was to save him many times in war, once in Tyrosh where he fought for the Lyseni and once in Lys where he fought for the Tyroshi. He even vowed that he wouldn't give up his bow even if he was offered the entire gold of Casterly Rock. Yet all his vows and talks did nothing when Andrew showed him a single gold dragon and the man practically threw him the bow as if it was no more than an empty cup. He even gave him the three arrows he had with the bow. With dark shafts and grey fletching, he couldn't find more decent arrows and didn't want to waste any of it. Andrew was a decent archer but his marksmanship was not as half as good as his swordsmanship. From his room high above the colored platform put up by the Braavosi to receive Rhaegar, he was sure that he could make the shot even there was a good seventy five yard distance between them.
He heard distant shouts and saw the guards and common folk from the lower docks to the upper stone way. Too many people. He hoped that they won't be a trouble for him or his plan.
The world was moonlight and shadow, and time became an endless round of sharpening Frost, the arrows and pulling the arrow string back to check its strength. He heard a soft splash as a serpent boat emerged beneath the bridge's central arch. "Oi, what hour?" Andrew called down to the man who stood by the snake's uplifted tail, pushing her onward with his pole.
The waterman gazed up, searching for the voice. "Four, by the Titan's roar." His words echoed hollowly off the swirling green waters and the walls of unseen buildings.
The stars and the moon gave way for the sun. More people came filling in, nobles of colored clothes and common people alike as the sun came up.
The sun came and went up and up in the sky, with still no sign of the King of the Seven Kingdoms. Andrew heard footsteps on the cobbled stone street beneath his building, though, and saw an old man walking to the harbor with a lantern to light his way. Andrew envied his light. His own lantern was on the verge of dying, the oil draining out.
As Dawn broke out, the world turned to the shade of a gloomy fire and the early morning sky was clear again. No clouds, thought Andrew. That was good. Rain or fog could doom him and everything he had waited for.
His eyes grew heavy with sleep and the eyelids drooped. Andrew opened them fast, faster than he had closed them. I should've slept more, he thought rubbing the sleep away from his eyes. There was no water to wash his face. The canal ran beneath but Andrew didn't want to go down and risk some clear shot. He never knew when he dozed next but he did. Suddenly somewhere to the south a warhorn blew waking him up from the sleep. It was no warhorn, Andrew knew. The Titan's roar. He is here. Andrew stood up and crossed the room and took his bow and arrows.
Motionless, Andrew Stark stood near the window looking down to the Purple Harbor. The air was full of mist and shouts. And Andrew waited for him. Waited in his little room with his bow and arrows.
Downstream to the Purple Harbor the path was blocked for commoners and highborn captains alike so as to make a clear way for Rhaegar Targaryen. At times the streams would be filled with rafts and carracks and ferries and rowboats borne on the current of the bigger canal but today they seemed abandoned.
The main canal from the purple harbor looked empty and Andrew stood near his window, waiting. . . watching. . . It felt like years waiting for Rhaegar in the room. The sight of a boat caught his eyes, or else the cloaks of the men on the boat. White cloaks streaming from the boats as flags would do from the tall masts of the ship. Uncle Arthur, Andrew thought. His bright sword, his bright armor and his bright smile. He desperately wished for his uncle to be with him now. Four, there were four white cloaks in the boat . . . and another dark cloak amidst them. The Kingsguard and their King.
A dozen other boats followed the first one but none of that was Andrew's concern. He never gave them a second look but for the first boat. The boats reached the colored dock and Andrew saw him when he climbed onto the dock. His long silver hair was in contrast to his dark clothing, and an eerily beautiful grace clung onto him like perfume. Andrew can't see his face clearly but he was sure that Rhaegar Targaryen was wearing his mask. And he was, there was the same easy smile plastered on his face when the pleasantries were over and he turned for Andrew to see him.
Let's see how pretty your face looks when I put an arrow through it, Andrew notched an arrow to the string, raised his bow and drew. Rhaegar Targaryen was still well far away from him, so he led him waiting, waiting. . .
Andrew pulled the goose feather back to his ear, aimed, and waited, waited for the right time to loose. The crowd of people made it difficult for him to even see his target. There were more targets for him now with Rhaegar's guards and the Braavosi noblemen and commoners alike. For a heartbeat, he missed Rhaegar in the crowd and lowered his bow to search for him. He found him or rather his hair, flanked by the Kingsguard, and the Kingsguard flanked by black cloaked Targaryen guardsmen. He got a clear shot at Rhaegar, but before he could take it some other bald man took the place of the silver head. Andrew sighed again and raised his bow again. Again and again, he got a clean shot at Rhaegar Targaryen, only for some common folk get in the way before he could take his shot.
Give me one clean shot at Rhaegar, he prayed to his father's gods and his mother's. It would take only one arrow for this to end. Give me Rhaegar.
His fingers were growing stiff and his thumb was bleeding, but still, Andrew notched and drew but never loosed. Rhaegar was getting away from him, slowly and gradually. Andrew was tempted to take the risk and loose an arrow with luck. If he was lucky enough the arrow might find itself lodged on to Rhaegar or else it may give away his spot and thwart all of his plans.
Rage filled within him with the thought of Rhaegar slipping from his hands. He never knew that he possessed this kind of rage. He should die, a voice inside him said. He killed your family, he should die. Andrew threw the bow down and took Frost from the ground. He vaulted out of the window and landed on the roof of the next building. Braavos was a crooked city. The buildings were built crooked but crowded.
Andrew moved over the stone roof, balanced lightly on the slanting roof, listening to the flutter of his heart, breathing slow deep breaths. A fall from here was a good twenty feet to ground. It may even cost his life. But something deep in him urged him to move on.
He ran halfway across the roof of the building and vaulted onto the next one near it, before jumping down the the inner bailey and running through the wooden planks, down the serpentine stone steps, past the small kitchen of some inn and jumping over a canal of four feet wide before climbing onto another building, stepping onto the crates, before jumping onto the kitchen roof and then to the main, coming down from the roof of a small house built right of over a canal running underneath it. He crossed a lichen covered bridge and ran along the canal wall and up more steps and back, and then down again and through a gate and passing through in and out of strange buildings until Andrew reached the crowd which was formed by Rhaegar Targaryen's arrival.
He passed through the crowd keeping Frost tight in his hand. Through the center, Rhaegar Targaryen walked amidst his Kingsguard and his endless guards. Andrew bowled past, shoving people aside, pushing them away, slamming into anyone in his way. When he came out from the crowd, he could see Rhaegar amidst his men. When he drew Frost from the sheath, he had no time to think after that. Two men in Targaryen cloaks moved to him. "Back now, lad," one of them said. Andrew cut off his extended arm and buried Frost deep into the other guard's throat even before he could draw his longsword from his scabbard. He moved so fast that everyone saw him only when the maimed guard's scream shrieked through the calm morning air. The madness sprung at once when the commoners all shrieked alike in fear and pushed and pulled over one another trying to get away from the place.
A warhorn blew to alert the men. Haroooooooooooooooooooooooo, it cried, its voice as long and low and chilling as a cold wind from the north. Rhaegar was surrounded by his Kingsguard and his other guardsmen and the guards of the Braavosi rushed to their masters.
Rhaegar's guards formed a circle around him, moving back to their ranks as soon as the warning horn blew. The sellswords and the other guards of the Braavosi nobles weren't so wise or disciplined as the men of Westeros. They charged at him and Andrew moved against them his white jacket streaming in the wind. Andrew held his ground against four men swinging and slashing Frost all around him. He saw more men coming at him from the corner of his eyes and getting cornered would mean death. Andrew found the opening with a man with a blue beard and caught him alongside his head, taking off half his head. A Dothraki came next to take the place of blue beard and took his place in death as well. Andrew ducked down a savage slash of his arakh and cut open his belly, spilling up his insides. He never stopped with the Dothraki but brought Frost in a deadly arc gutting two more men before getting back to his feet. He opened a Targaryen spearman from shoulder to armpit before severing off the leg of a dark summer islander and ending his torture by lopping off his head.
His sword sheared off limbs, cracked heads, broke shields asunder. With the everyone reaching to him falling down mortally injured or dead the other guards sought out to take their masters to safety. The Braavosi with their multiple guardsmen ran for their life while the Westerosi moved as a unit with their king safe amidst them.
Frost was light as a feather in his fist as he wielded the valyrian steel sword all around him. A handful still fought him, the rest dead or fled. He had to take a breathe to get those men as well. Andrew lodged Frost deep into the armpit of a man before slashing the throat of another one behind him. He took a small breath using the break he got and pressed on the attack before the others begin. Frost cut through leather and flesh as if it was butter and Andrew heard anguished screams and shrieks around him. One sword managed to scrape at his arm before flying off to almost fifteen feet away from him and he thrust Frost right through the heart of the wielder.
In the commotion the people caused it was hard for Rhaegar's guard to move their king over, unlike the individual Braavosi. Andrew charged at them. He cut a bloody path through the guards in order to get to Rhaegar. He slashed opened a man's throat, cracking another one's skull soon after it, severing a man's hand which fell at halfway trying to hack at his head. Frost stuck once while he drove it through the eye of the another. He left it there and leaned back when the man to his left slashed at him overhead trying to split him in half from head to groin. Andrew caught his hand when the man missed his slash at him wildly and pulled the man to him, driving his elbow against his nose and yanking the blade away from him. He mislaid the stolen blade in someone else's throat but had an opening to retrieve Frost from the dead man's eye.
Men were crawling all around him, men butchered and bleeding, coughing up blood, staggering, most dying. He moved further for Rhaegar, delivering quicker cleaner deaths to those strong enough to stand.
His white jacket and the white shirt inside it were covered in blood, more of his enemies' blood than his. The battle fever. He had never thought to experience it himself, though Syrio told him of it often enough during his training. How time seemed to blur and slow and even stop, how the past and the future vanished until there was nothing but the instant, how fear fled, and thought fled, and even your body. "You don't feel your wounds then, or the ache in your back and your shoulders from the weight of your sword, or the sweat running down into your eyes. You stop feeling, you stop thinking, you stop being you, there is only the fight, the foe, this man and then the next and the next and the next, and you know they are afraid and tired but you're not, you're alive, and death is all around you but their swords move so slowly, you can dance through them laughing." Battle fever. Let this fever end in justice. Justice with Rhaegar Targaryen's death.
The Targaryen guards tried again. Another spearman ran at him. Andrew stepped away from the head of his spear, and cut his hand, then his arm, moving around him in a circle. Another man, wielding a dirk, thrust at him, holding it as if it were a knife. All Andrew needed was to stay away from him and let Frost do the work. The valyrian steel reached the man easy enough, cutting through to his chest easy as a knife slices off a cake.
A man-at-arms tried to thrust at Andrew's face with his sword. He knocked the blade aside and buried Frost in the nape of the man's neck. He could almost see Rhaegar now, safe between his kingsguard. Andrew reached for him with Frost only to be stopped by a golden sword of a kingsguard knight. When Andrew pressed his attack at him his brother came to his side with a spear making him back to defend himself. You should've stood for my uncle. He was your brother too. His rage followed him after that and Andrew pressed forward to meet them.
He raised his sword and drove at them, Frost alive in his hands. The white knight with his golden sword jumped back, parrying, but he followed, pressing the attack. No sooner did he turn one cut of the golden sword than the thrust from the spear was upon him. Frost kissed the golden sword and sprang apart and kissed the spearhead. Andrew felt tired. He was fighting tired, with death balanced on every stroke. Frost felt heavy as lead in his hands which forced him to use a two-handed grip. It wouldn't take much. Two more songs and this dance is over.
High, low, overhand, he rained down steel upon the white brothers. Left, right, backslash, swinging so hard that sparks flew when the swords came together, upswing, sideslash, overhand, always attacking, moving into them, step and slide, strike and step, step and strike, hacking, slashing, faster, faster, faster . . .
. . . until, breathless, he stepped back for a moment of respite. The kingsguard knights had their strength though. The edge of the golden sword found its way to slash his clothes and skin alike. The spearhead almost succeeded in piercing him, hadn't he moved in time half of the weirwood shaft would have come through his back.
Andrew took a slow deep breath. He whirled the blade back up above his head and flew at them again.
Andrew could not have said how long he pressed the attack. It might have been minutes or it might have been hours; time slept when swords woke.
One of the slashes from the golden sword raked across his brow, and blood ran down into his right eye. He cursed and moved for them again using his skill and speed. Frost scraped past the parry of the golden sword and bit into the kingsguard's upper thigh. A red flower blossomed in the white cloth and before Andrew could end him the weirwood spear stopped him. He turned away from the savage thrust and caught the white shaft at halfway. One slash across it and the weirwood broke in half with a loud crack. Andrew thrust the spearhead at the white knight and lodged it between shoulder and breastplate, the blow clattering off the white armor. The knight went down. By then his brother came back at him, limping.
The wound Andrew gave him seemed to fester and rot his skill. He was not swinging his golden sword as quickly as he'd done earlier, nor raising it as high. Andrew soon found the opening when the kingsguard knight lunged forward trying to stab at his throat. Too close, Andrew thought as he turned the blade away before driving Frost right through the knight's ribs in one fluidic motion. Blood gushed out in a scarlet fountain, drenching the long white sleeve of his jacket and his arm. The lifeless body of the knight fell to the ground when he pulled Frost free from him with the clang of his golden sword following his corpse.
The rush of the people hadn't stopped even after he had come all this way from the start. He wondered how many people had been here before everything set loose. Andrew saw the other knight on his feet again with a sword in his hand in place of the weirwood spear. He was about to move for him when he felt a throbbing ache in his right thigh. When he looked down, he was surprised to see an arrow jutting out the back of it. When did that happen? Before he could find the answer for it another blow in the chest pushed him back. Andrew looked at the way of the arrows and found them. There were dark shapes in the high stone buildings across the platform, slipping out from the dark, facing the windows, backs against the stone with bows in their hands. He was late to move when another arrow sunk in his waist just above the hipbone.
He saw Rhaegar, still safe behind his kingsguard. He saw his other guards now circling around him as if he was a wounded animal. Andrew cut down the first man as he stepped closer, shoved past a second, slashed at a third. Through the madness he heard someone yell, but whether it was directed at him or the archers he could not say. He caught the spear of a guard from his right and directed the iron tip to another guard at his right. Andrew caught the arm of the spearman and twisted it behind his back. Keeping the guard to the front he moved for the canals as another flight of arrows took to air. He heard the soft sound of arrows plunging into meat followed by the dying shriek of the man. One arrow crossed both of them and plunged against the hard packed ground between the cobblestones. Andrew stepped past it, walking as fast as his legs could take him. His wounded leg buckled under him, and he had to swallow a scream. The man-shield was heavy in his arms and every step felt harder than the one before. Arrows rained again, falling all around him. He saw the green water of the canal and jumped into the cold water with the dead man.
He heard a short sharp woof, as if someone had blown in his ear. Green water smashed him across the face, filling his nose and mouth. He was choking, drowning. Unsure which way was up, Andrew wrestled the river in blind panic until suddenly he broke the surface. He spat out water, sucked in air and submerged again under the water when he saw men searching for him.
The current had him in its teeth by then, spinning him around and around. He kicked and tried to keep away from the land. Upstream, Andrew thought, if they searched for him they would go downstream to the harbor. There was only a little chance for a man wounded so terribly as him to have the strength to swim upstream against the current.
But Andrew was a strong swimmer. Years of swimming in the hot springs of Winterfell and then in the canals of Braavos made him a better swimmer than most men.
He sucked in a great gulp of air and dove, kicking for the bottom of the river. His only hope was to stay underwater and to swim hard away from the guards as far as he can. Andrew held onto Frost tightly as he knifed through the green murk. He swam past a wooden plank and a wooden crate, kicking with all the strength left in his legs, pushing himself up against the current, the water filling his eyes. Deeper he went, and deeper, and deeper still. With every stroke it grew harder to hold his breath. He remembered seeing the bottom, soft and dim, as a stream of bubbles burst from his lips. Something touched his leg . . . a snag or a fish or some arrow Rhaegar's guards had loosed at him, he could not tell.
He needed air by then, but he was not sure about coming to the surface. He twisted in the water to look up, but there was nothing to see but green darkness and then he spun too far and suddenly he could no longer tell up from down. Panic took hold of him. His hands flailed against the bottom of the river and sent up a cloud of mud that blinded him. His chest was growing tighter by the instant. He clawed at the water, kicking, pushing himself, turning, his lungs screaming for air, kicking, kicking, lost now in the river murk, kicking, kicking, kicking until he could kick no longer.
When he came back to the surface, Andrew flailed for something to grab on to, knowing that once he went down he was not like to come back up. Somehow his hand found the stone edge of the canal. Clutching it tight as a desperate lover, he shinnied up foot by foot. His eyes were full of water, his arms and clothes were full of blood, and his entire head and body throbbed horribly. Gods give me strength to reach the ground . . . He prayed to his gods, both his father's and mother's.
He pulled at the stone edge with all his might. Finally, he rolled over the side and lay breathless and exhausted, flat on his back. He looked to his sides and found everything empty aside for some old buildings and the rush of water.
How did I swim all this way with a sword in one hand? That was another question he could not answer.
Andrew put Frost down beside him and looked down at the arrow in his leg. He grabbed hold of the shaft on his thigh and gave it a tug, but the arrowhead was sunk deep in the meat of his leg, and the pain when he pulled on it was excruciating. He tried to think back on the madness he passed, but all he could remember was the arrows and the pain.
This is going to be agony. The arrow had to come out, though, and nothing good could come of waiting. Andrew curled his hand around the fletching, took a deep breath, and shoved the arrow forward. He grunted, then cursed. It hurt so much he had to stop. I am bleeding like a butchered pig, he thought, but there was nothing to be done for it until the arrow was out. He grimaced and tried again . . . and soon stopped again, trembling. Once more. This time he screamed, but when he was done the arrowhead was poking through the back of his thigh. Andrew pushed back his bloody breeches to get a better grip, grimaced, and slowly drew the shaft through his leg.
He lay on the ground afterward, clutching his prize and bleeding quietly, too weak to move. He knew that he was like to bleed to death. He looked up at the sky and found his father and mother peering down at him. All he needed to do was nothing. A few moments more, and he would be with his family now. "Look, I'm coming to you mama," he said to his mother, chuckling and wincing at the pain. "I'll see you soon papa," gritting his teeth he told his father.
He turned his head and waited. The sun came closer to him as he waited. That makes no sense, thought Andrew. The sun never shone brightly in Braavos. This is death, he thought. If this is death, it is beautiful.