Mid-Late May, 301 AC
Olyvar Sand gripped his wife's hand tightly as they descended the servants' steps.
There were several ways to reach the makeshift dragonpit where Daenerys Targaryen had confined her children, but the steps were the quickest way, steep, narrow steps hidden in the walls. Brienne of Tarth followed alongside them, bearing a lantern that glowed dimly in the darkness, the light flickering as the flame danced. Olyvar had walked this path only once before, the first day after the audience.
Daenerys might be shattered by the news he brought, well as she hid it, but she was true to her word nonetheless. Down and down and down they'd gone, silent but for the sound of their footsteps scuffing on the stone. Then Ser Barristan Selmy and Robett Glover had born the lanterns, Glover eyeing Ser Barristan with distrust and keeping himself betwixt Olyvar and the former Kingsguard, now Queensguard. Even when they finally reached the pair of huge iron doors, Glover still kept close, despite the fact that tiny Daenerys and old Ser Barristan were breathing heavily from the descent, much more heavily than Olyvar or Robett.
"Viserion was the easiest of my children to chain," Daenerys said, when at last she had caught her breath. "I brought him here myself, carrying him. He was the size of a dog, a large one, but he weighed almost nothing. There were oxen inside for him to eat; he flew inside and feasted on them. Once he was sated he fell asleep, and my Unsullied chained him."
She had turned seventeen only ten days past, but her voice sounded much younger, a girlish whisper tinged with guilt, oddly familiar. To his surprise he found himself thinking of Loreza, the time she confessed to the terrible crime of asking the Stranger to take Obella away. They had quarreled over some trifle, and Loreza was desperately afraid that the Seven might actually listen to her impulsive prayer and slay her elder sister in the night.
"Dragon bones are hollow, or so the maesters say." Olyvar could not offer words of comfort to this conquering queen, nor console her as he had consoled Loreza. Dragons were dangerous beasts; small wonder she felt the need to confine them, if the rumors of them hunting children were true. Aerys would never have done such a thing; he'd have placed bets on where and when the dragons would strike next.
"I never had a maester."
Daenerys stared at the thick iron doors. Heavy chains bound them shut, though the chains looked very strange, their links blurred as though—
"Are those melted?" Glover asked, his sharp voice echoing down the stone hall.
Olyvar stepped closer to the door, Glover clasping his upper arm to keep him from drawing too near, a protective gesture which Olyvar begrudgingly allowed. Now he could see how warped the metal was on the corners, how here and there blobs of iron had oozed down the frame before hardening once more.
"A dragon is no tame creature, to submit easily," Daenerys said, voice quivering despite her smile. "He has melted several sets of doors; the smiths are only too happy to replace them and rob my treasury into the bargain."
Daenerys raised a hand to the thick iron doors, reaching for a handle long as a man's arm. The Unsullied who guarded the doors were watching Glover and Olyvar, so they did not see the space between pale fingertip and dark iron shrink and shrink. Only Olyvar saw the moment when skin touched metal, and then the queen yelped in pain, yanking the hand back as tears sprang to her eyes.
"Your Grace!" Ser Barristan exclaimed, finally tearing his eyes from Glover.
The queen did not whimper, only stared at her fingertip, at the cherry-red skin and the blisters already rising to the surface. Ser Barristan was speaking to the Unsullied in rapid High Valyrian, too fast for Olyvar to catch more than every third word.
"Water," Olyvar interrupted, careful to pronounce the word as old Maester Lonnel did during their lessons. "Water, for the queen. For..." he couldn't remember the word for burn. "For hot hand. Will help."
He had to say it twice more, and louder, before one of the Unsullied heard, quickly handing a waterskin to Olyvar. Carefully Olyvar approached the queen, dropping to his knees before asking her to hold out her hand. Daenerys obliged, though she eyed him with distrust. When the cool water ran over her fingertip she hissed, then sighed as the water eased her pain. Olyvar frowned. If he kept pouring, the water would soon be gone.
"Here," Olyvar said, extending the waterskin towards Daenerys' uninjured hand. She took it, brow furrowed, but she understood when she saw Olyvar form a cup with his hands. She poured the water into his palms, then dipped her fingertip into the clear pool.
"Haldon Halfmaester should know a recipe for burn ointment," Olyvar offered, not stupid enough to suggest she try Maester Perceval. Where Lonnel was skilled in the study of languages and history, even a little dragonlore, Maester Perceval had dedicated his life to the study of healing, forging link after link in everything from herblore to setting bones to aiding childbirth.
"When the time comes I'll take good care of your sweet bride," Perceval had assured him soon after they departed Dorne, when they were docked in Lys and the maester had come aboard to discuss some rare bird he'd sighted with Deziel and Lonnel. Olyvar had felt an unworthy urge to shove the man overboard. Sansa would bear no children until long after they returned to Dorne, and then only if she wished to. He would not be his father, condemning a young girl to die, nor his grandfather, whose vile rape of Rhaella had wrecked her fertility after.
Not that his vicious grandfather had the sense to see it. Elia said that Aerys had blamed Rhaella at first, accusing her of adultery and confining the poor woman to Maegor's Holdfast, her who had loved to ride out and see the wildflowers and fawns to be glimpsed in the Kingswood. When that spurious theory proved false, he turned to blaming wet nurses, even his own mistresses, anyone and everyone but he who was truly responsible. After so much torment it was nigh on a miracle that Rhaella had managed to birth Viserys. Olyvar wondered if the Mother had finally taken pity on the poor queen, granting her a child to give her comfort and to reduce how often her husband visited her bed to inflict his cruel attentions.
Not that Aerys had ever stopped. Daenerys was proof of that. Though many women bore a last child before passing forty, the last birth proved one too many for his poor grandmother. Olyvar glanced up, taking in Daenerys' features, the silver hair, the violet eyes, the small swell of belly protruding from a slim girlish frame. She looked different, somehow, than she did upon her throne, younger and more delicate. Her eyes, though... there was a hunger there, a strange blend of kindness and tenacity that he'd seen before, in oil painted upon canvas.
"You look like grandmother Rhaella," he blurted before he could stop himself. "Your mother, I mean."
"Ser Barristan says so," Daenerys admitted, looking at her finger rather than at him. "He doesn't like to talk about her much. It makes him sad."
"My mother didn't speak of her often either." Princess Elia only mentioned his grandmother in fits and starts, when something or other reminded her of the departed queen. A field of treasure flowers in full bloom, the sound of some ballad Rhaella had loved before Aerys banned her from employing singers. "But I can share what I know, if you like."
Daenerys had just begun to smile when a monstrous roar shook the iron doors. Forgetting himself Olyvar leapt to his feet, grabbing the queen by the wrist and yanking her back as heat blazed from behind the doors. Daenerys made no protest, her eyes wide as she retreated from air that blurred and shimmered as if it were the hottest of summer days.
"He does this almost every day, the Unsullied tell me," Ser Barristan said when he had made sure they were a safe distance down the hall, Glover once again glued to Olyvar's side. "He is melting the doors near as fast as the smiths can make new ones."
"Is he not fed enough?" Daenerys asked. Ser Barristan hesitated, unsure of what to say. Olyvar wondered if the expression of venerable uselessness had looked the same when Ser Barristan was deciding how to respond to Aerys' latest madness.
"No man can say how often a dragon must feed," Ser Barristan finally allowed. Except all the maesters who wrote on the subject, but King Baelor decided to burn all their work, the singleminded fool. Knowlege was sacred to the Crone, after all, a fact Baelor had most steadfastly ignored. "They only feed him on days when he is quiet and the doors are cool; perhaps once a sennight, once a fortnight."
Daenerys glanced at Olyvar. Olyvar gazed back, trying to read the thoughts behind her inscrutable gaze. Glover thought she intended to feed him to the dragon and claim he died trying to tame it; Sansa thought the offer of a dragon was meant as a test of his worthiness. Olyvar thought it might be both; the gods knew he had been angry when he first learned the truth of his birth, and he wasn't trapped in a false marriage and four moons pregnant.
"You will go no further," Daenerys declared. "Even I could not face him as he is now, and I am his mother. We will wait."
And wait they had, but Viserion grew no less wrathful. After three weeks of fruitless waiting Daenerys finally gave orders that the dragon's next meal be drenched with milk of the poppy. The dragon devoured the dead sheep as he always did, either not noticing or not caring about the substance soaked into their wool. That was a week ago; since then not a peep had been heard from within the pit. The doors were cold, the dragon silent.
They passed the storerooms, then the cisterns, then the dungeons, Sansa's hand growing damp with sweat as her grip grew tighter. "Granaries full of grain, and yet there are no mice nor rats," Sansa whispered, uneasy. Her voice sounded too small for her body; Maester Lonnel had measured her the other day and found she was nearly six feet. Daenerys had nearly spit out her mouthful of lemon wine when she learned Sansa was three years her junior, a reaction so ordinary that Olyvar had immediately liked her the better for it.
"You said Buttons would not come down here," Olyvar remembered. Sansa nodded, the only sign of her distress the sight of her nibbling on her lower lip. She was so eager to help, so determined, and failing to reach the dragon's lair bothered her much more than she would say.
"He puffed up like a hedgehog as soon as he passed the cisterns," she said, frowning. "His heart beat so fast... I couldn't make him go any further, it would have been cruel." Olyvar did not disagree. A cat was less than a mouthful to a dragon. He had not wanted to bring Sansa down here either, but she was better at arguing than he was, and the fact that she could speak to animals through her skinchanging was an ability so useful as to be impossible to refuse, despite his many, many qualms.
"I like it not, my lady," said Brienne of Tarth. The silk of her surcoat gleamed in the lantern's light, her chainmail clinking softly. He wondered if Robett Glover was still sulking over Princess Sansa preferring the protection of a Stormlander maid to a northern lord, even though he looked rather relieved when no one asked him to brave the dragon's lair a second time. "We should go back. You are no Targaryen."
"I am a Stark," Sansa replied, mule stubborn. "And I already swore not to enter the pit." Despite the growing heat she shivered.
By the time they reached the pair of Unsullied and the iron doors they guarded, Sansa was shaking so hard it almost seemed as if she were having a fit. Don't, Olyvar wanted to say. It was one thing to speak to a bird or share the mind of a friendly cat. It was another to try and address a dragon.
His face must have shown his unease; Sansa patted his shoulder. "It can't be as bad as Cersei," she jested.
Neither he nor Brienne laughed. Sansa's face was too pale, her eyes too wide, the whites overtaking the blue.
"He's asleep," she said, after a moment's pause. "I'll have to wake him before I can speak to him."
Usually Sansa lay upon a featherbed or settled herself in a chair before attempting to change her skin, but there were no such things here down in the dark. Instead she sat on the floor, her back leaning against the brick wall. She had dressed herself with the expectation of such discomfort; her skirts were layers of thick roughspun borrowed from among the Dornish maids. Olyvar sat beside her; she always slumped when she left her skin, and there was no armrest here to catch her. Brienne stood over them, her eyes fixed on the iron doors as if the dragon might appear at any moment.
Pale fingers grasped golden ones. He could feel her heartbeat fluttering as she exhaled, trying and failing to calm herself. Olyvar counted the breaths, matching her rhythm. Several hundred breaths passed before Sansa opened her eyes, still blue.
"I can't reach him," she said, frustrated. "Something— he feels wrong, as if he isn't a beast at all. If I could see him, perhaps..."
Olyvar shared an uneasy look with Brienne before glancing at the Unsullied. One had the rich ebony skin of the Summer Islands, the other the pale hair and paler skin of Lys. Neither spoke the Common Tongue, but thankfully between Olyvar and Brienne they had enough High Valyrian to be understood.
The dragon had slept all week, said the Unsullied named Haraq. Never had he been so quiet when he was awake; there had been no roaring, no iron doors blazing red-hot. He should sleep for another week, at least according to the Westerosi who had brought the sheep laced with milk of the poppy. Haldon Halfmaester, most likely. And so with lead in his stomach Olyvar asked the guards to unchain the heavy doors, heart thudding in his ears as the doors opened, releasing a gust of hot wind and the smell of ash.
The pit was a vast emptiness, black as pitch. "Where is he?" Olyvar asked, uncertain and unwillingly to draw closer.
"There," the Lyseni Unsullied pointed, handing Olyvar a torch as tall as a spear. Olyvar raised it, dread curling in his veins.
An outstretched wing dangled from the ceiling of the pit, pale cream against brick scorched black. There was a glint of metal too, some remnant of chain by the dragon's neck. Of course, Olyvar thought, numb with fear. A dragon is no ordinary beast, but a beast he remains. He's dug himself a den.
"Oh," Sansa gasped in his ear. He nearly leapt out of his skin.
"You swore," he hissed, careful not to wake the slumbering beast.
"Lady Brienne released me, on the condition that I return immediately. And you're coming with me, in case he awakens roaring like Arya used to."
"Elia is the same," Olyvar said as he led her from the pit, one eye on the dragon above.
Some foul odor was in the air, not just ash and smoke but a sweet rotten smell. Some scrap of undevoured meat, forgotten and left to rot in the corners, most likely. He breathed easier when the doors were shut, thick chains once more wrapped about the handles.
Again they sat upon the dirty floor, hands clasped, her head leaning on his shoulder. "I can," Sansa muttered to herself as she closed her blue eyes.
When she opened them again the blue was gone, the whites staring into nothingness. His stomach clenched; it was a ghastly sight, no matter that he had seen her do it before, skinchanging her sweet cat first to prove the truth of her claims, then to gather information.
Something felt different this time, though. Her skin was clammy, her mouth gaping open in an expression of utter terror. The air felt thick and smelt of lightning, as though a thunderstorm gathered within the depths of the pyramid. The pressure grew and grew, so much worse than the time Olyvar had dived into the sea and swum as deep as he could; his ears felt strange, as though they might burst.
He and Brienne spoke at the same moment.
"My lady—"
"Sansa—"
Sansa shrieked. Olyvar clapped his hands over his ears, as did Brienne and the Unsullied. The terrible noise reverberated off the brick walls, the narrow tunnel amplifying the inhuman wail of agony. Somehow it both burned and froze, the sound stripping his skin like a sandstorm in the desert.
Without warning the sound cut off, replaced by the noise of gagging and heaving and the splash of vomit hitting the floor. Sansa's hair was loose beneath a silver net; Olyvar gathered all the strands not yet touched by bile and wove them into a quick plait, tucking it under the net.
The Unsullied Haraq stepped forward, spiked cap gleaming bronze over tightly kinked dark curls. "Water," he said in the Common Tongue," handing Olyvar a bulging waterskin.
"Thank you," Olyvar answered in High Valyrian. Sansa was still retching, even though her belly was clearly empty. Gently he held up the waterskin, trickling water into her mouth. She drank greedily, sweat dappling her skin as though she had ridden a hundred miles under the Dornish sun. When she pushed the waterskin away he used the rest to wash the bile from her hair, at least the worst of it.
"Can you stand?" He finally asked, when she no longer looked half dead. Were they above ground he might carry her to their chambers, but climbing so many steps while carrying a girl six feet tall was not a task he fancied, slender though she was.
"He's half mad," Sansa choked, looking up at Olyvar with eyes so wide that for a moment he thought she'd left her skin again. "The collar, it's too small, he can barely breathe. He melted the rest of his chains, but he can't reach the collar. His skin is growing over it." She dry heaved. "Always, always in the dark. Alone. Man smell, and the smell of dead meat, cold and hard. No brothers, no air, no soaring through the clouds. He digs, and digs, and the cage never ends, he breathes flame at the doors but each time he melts them new ones appear, over and over, and his neck hurts him so, he can barely breathe, or think, he just wants to get out."
Brienne made the abrupt sound of a woman choking back bile. Olyvar wished he had her fortitude; he vomited, the remains of his breakfast splattering over the remains of Sansa's.
"Seven hells," he gasped, mouth and throat burning from the acid. "How long as he been down here?" He could not remember if Daenerys had said when she first caged the fearsome beasts. Brienne asked the Unsullied, her voice slow and faltering as she sought the words of High Valyrian. When the Unsullied answered her face turned grim.
"A year," Brienne said faintly. Her bright blue eyes were different than Sansa's, lighter. Ser Deziel thought they resembled a summer sky, or so he'd absentmindedly mentioned before he stopped talking to Olyvar. Usually they were as steady as any knight's, but now they were filled with unshed tears.
"A year," Olyvar echoed, stupidly.
In the end Sansa only barely managed to reach the foot of the servants' steps under her own power. At that point she half collapsed into Olyvar's arms, dizzier than a Fowler on a rolling ship. He carried her up as many flights as he could manage, but it was Brienne who carried her the rest of the way, fretting and fussing over her charge the entire way.
"Careful, m'lady," Olyvar gasped as they neared their chambers, clutching the stitch in his side. "Lord Robett will grow jealous."
"Let him," Brienne huffed. She'd afforded Princess Sansa the dignity of carrying her like a bride, though slinging the dazed girl over her shoulder would have been easier. "That poor beast..."
"Viserion," Sansa whimpered. She'd long since run out of tears, but traces of them remained in her bloodshot eyes and puffy nose.
Olyvar felt like crying himself as he girded his loins for the courage to approach Ser Deziel Dalt the next day. Despite the seven years between them they had been close as brothers, ever since they first met in the Water Gardens, Deziel a dignified page of ten, eager to investigate the many rare plants grown there, Olyvar a chubby-cheeked boy of four, recently arrived from Braavos and overwhelmed by being the only boy among what seemed like infinite sisters.
When he took to following Deziel around the older boy had not minded. Deziel liked having a helper willing to dig through muddy roots and climb up trees to figure out their mysteries. Olyvar wasn't nearly as interested in plants, but it was still good fun, and Deziel was always willing to play at swords when they weren't grubbing about in the dirt.
Fifteen years had passed since those days. They had seen much of each other as pages and squires, Deziel always happy to provide guidance and encouragement, Olyvar reciprocating with seeds and dried plants from wherever Prince Oberyn took him. It was Deziel that Olyvar confided in after his halfhearted attempt at sleeping with a friendly tavern maid soon after his sixteenth nameday; they'd gotten quite drunk, Deziel listening as Olyvar bemoaned his awkward fumbling. They spoke for hours and hours, lamenting and rejoicing at the beauty of women, arguing at length over whether Olyvar was still a man-maid, given how quickly things had ended, talking of the future. The only thing they had not talked about was the secret burning within Olyvar's chest.
"She knew before I did," Deziel said as they finally left Daenerys' throne room. He jerked his head at Princess Sansa, who was having a whispered argument with a thunderstruck Robett Glover. In the distance he could Daenerys giving orders in a clear loud voice, sending for a scribe to write a summons for some Pentoshi by the name of Illyrio Mopatis. Olyvar forced himself to ignore the distractions; he had never seen Dez's dark eyes so hurt.
"You swore not to tell anyone, fine. The gods only know how she figured it out on her own, and I don't want to know. When you asked me to join you on a wild dragon chase, I agreed without question. Whatever was going on, you would tell me as soon as you could, surely. Across the Narrow Sea we sailed, that bedamned turban on your head, and still you said nothing. We landed in Meereen, biding our time before meeting this dragon queen, and still you said nothing."
"I didn't—"
"What?" Deziel turned on him, voice half choked with anger. "You didn't trust me? You didn't think I deserved some warning that the man I knew all my life was not what he seemed? That my best friend—"
"I didn't want things to change!" Olyvar snapped, guilt and anger roiling in his belly. "I didn't want you to, to see me differently, to fear me or flatter me."
Deziel reared back as if Olyvar had punched him in the gut, his eyes wide, his nostrils flaring. "Oh, my apologies, Your Grace," he said coldly. "I did not know you took me for a craven or a lickspittle."
"No," Olyvar said, horrified. "No, never, I—"
"Congratulations, Olyvar. I do see you differently."
With that Deziel stalked off, and Olyvar had barely seen hide nor hair of him since. By contrast old Ser Gulian Qorgyle had been near giddy with excitement once the revelation sunk in, delighted by his friend Oberyn's cunning. Robett Glover was cautiously pleased by the existence of a rival who might fling the Lannisters off the Iron Throne; Brienne of Tarth was suddenly much more understanding of Sansa's refusal to abandon her husband and sail north.
Lady Nymella Toland and Nym had already known; both thought he had handled himself decently, considering the spectacular mess created by whatever lying villain had taken some orphaned silver-haired boy and raised him to believe that he was Aegon Targaryen, son of Rhaegar. But Deziel's anger was a quarrel sunk deep within Olyvar's gut, a wound that stung all the worse because after weeks of sulking and venting his spleen at Nym he could finally admit that Deziel had reason to be angry.
"Is something wrong?" Edric Dayne asked. His voice cracked halfway through, a dull blush rising to his cheeks.
"No, Ned," Olyvar told his squire, ruffling his pale blond hair. Lord of Starfall he might be, but Edric was also a lad of thirteen. He did not need to know every burden that plagued Olyvar's heart.
"Are you and Ser Deziel still fighting?" Olyvar winced. Right, he's thirteen, not stupid. Even a blind man would notice how Deziel had been avoiding him.
"Yes," he admitted, making a note to introduce Edric to the vile torture known as press ups. His squire had quick reflexes and quicker feet, but strength was not one of his natural gifts. That was also the excuse he'd used for making Edric carry the rather cumbersome potted plant they were bringing to Deziel's chambers.
"Oh." Edric worried at his lip. "Is that why I'm carrying this?"
Before Daenerys Targaryen conquered Meereen, the Great Masters had cultivated exceptional gardens upon the many terraces of their pyramids. Although those pyramids were now being dismantled by their former owners, the rest of their wealth and titles had been spread among Daenerys' followers, from the Dothraki maids who served as her ladies-in-waiting to the highest ranking eunuchs of her Unsullied. Their Commander, Grey Worm, had already adopted an heir from among the many orphans in the city, a shy boy of five who stuck to the eunuch like a bur whenever he was inside the pyramid.
It was Grey Worm who now owned the exceptional wealth and many titles of the former House Loraq. More importantly, it was he who owned House Loraq's breathtaking gardens. Even from the Great Pyramid Olyvar could tell that the purple-bricked pyramid had the largest, lushest gardens; it had been simple enough to find out that they now belonged to Grey Worm.
"Might I speak to the gardeners of your pyramid?" Olyvar asked when he caught the Unsullied commander in the hall one afternoon. Grey Worm stiffened, confused, his new son clutching to a stocky leg and looking up at Olyvar with wide eyes. Olyvar crouched, giving the child a little wave.
"Is it the will of Queen Daenerys?"
Now it was Olyvar's turn to be confused. Grey Worm spoke the Common Tongue well enough; had he somehow misunderstood? "Should I have asked the queen first? I was told the lands and goods of House Loraq were yours now."
"They are this one's property, yes, by the grace of Her Worship."
"A friend of mine loves rare flowers and trees," Olyvar explained. "Could I speak to your gardeners and perhaps purchase something to give him?"
Grey Worm thought for a long moment, his square face still. "This one is trained in the way of sword and spear, not growing green things. The gardeners who tend the pyramid's gardens are free men, not gifts to be bought and sold."
"No!" Olyvar said, appalled. "I want to ask them about the plants and then buy a plant. Not a gardener! Though I'll need to have the gardener explain how the plant is to be taken care of."
"Oh." Grey Worm's face cleared. "That is acceptable."
And so the next day after morning prayers, Olyvar, Ser Gulian Qorgyle, and a few Dornish men-at-arms had ridden to the Pyramid of Loraq. The terraces were far below the lofty heights where Great Masters toiled in the hot sun, prying up the bricks laid by the ancestors' slaves. A poetic punishment it might be, but the queen's notion of justice was not the same as his own. Better to take their heads and be done with it.
Not all the gardeners shared his views, judging by the looks of vindictive glee some bore as they spoke of the fall of House of Loraq. Thank the Seven that Ser Gulian spoke High Valyrian fluently; conversation flowed much faster. The freedmen seemed pleased by the praise Olyvar lavished upon their lovingly tended gardens, and when he asked to see their rarest, dearest plant, they almost came to blows arguing with each other over which shrub or tree he should favor. Whether such fervor came from a matter of pride or from the promise of gold he could not say; likely it varied from man to man. In the end Olyvar, overwhelmed, allowed himself to be led all over the terraces, looking at each in turn, Grey Worm's seneschal following closely behind.
The plant he chose in the end was one of their subtler treasures, a juniper tree that stood no more than three feet tall, its trunk gracefully twisted. "From Leng," Ser Gulian had translated, eyeing the gardener with some surprise. The maesters said Lengii were tall, with skin like teak, but the Lengii gardener was no taller than Olyvar, his skin a pale gold. It seemed that in Leng growing miniature ornamental trees was an art form as much as sculpting or painting. Some YiTish prince had sought to build his own collection of dwarf shrubs, but the Lengii ship had been taken by slavers in the Jade Sea, the gardeners sold alongside their precious trees.
There were other plants he might have chosen, shrubs with bright flower blossoms, trees with fruits he'd never seen, but it was the juniper he chose nonetheless. There were junipers in Dorne; often he and Deziel had sat beneath the juniper trees in the gardens of Lemonwood. And there was something about the little tree, some strength of spirit that made it thrive despite its confines...
"Ser Olyvar?" Olyvar blinked, his thoughts interrupted by the strained sound of Edric's voice. "It's very heavy." His squire's arms trembled, the juniper's needles twitching.
"Give it here."
The juniper rested in a shallow oblong dish of unglazed earthenware; carefully Olyvar took it from his squire, resting the dish against his belly as he walked. I should have asked the servants for a cart, Olyvar thought grimly. Thank the gods they were near Deziel's chambers; the Dornish were all hosted along the same corridor on a level of the Great Pyramid whose bricks were grey as ash.
Perros Blackmont answered Edric's knock, a heavy tome clutched in one hand.
"Who is it?" Deziel called, his voice distant as though he stood out on the terrace.
"Ser Olyvar and Edric Dayne," Perros called back. There was a long pause.
"Inform Ser Olyvar that I am occupied."
"He has a weird plant," Edric shouted, darting a hopeful look up at his knight master.
Another long pause. "Fine. Perros, take that book back to Jynessa, and remind her that just because she can half read Valyrian glyphs doesn't mean that she knows what she's doing."
"Jyn had me bring him the book because she thought it was about rare flowers," Perros whispered as he held the door open for Olyvar to enter, oddly delighted. "I told her she was translating it wrong, but she didn't believe me. Ser Deziel near dropped it when he realized it was poetry about—" he glanced at Edric, listening curiously. "Uh, a different kind of flowers."
"Would you excuse us?" Olyvar asked, adjusting his hold on the earthenware dish. "I believe Ser Symon and Brienne planned to spar; you should both run down to the training hall and join them."
He found Deziel sitting on the terrace, contemplating an olive tree whose branches shaded a shallow pool. Deziel did not turn to face him when Olyvar set the juniper down on a stone bench, nor when Olyvar sat beside him, staring up at the olive tree.
"I didn't really think you'd run screaming in terror or turn into a bootlicker," Olyvar said. The tree's branches swayed in the light breeze, the long slim leaves dancing. "I... I don't want to be Aegon Targaryen. Dorne is my home, not King's Landing. I want to be there when Arianne has her first babe, I want to watch my sisters grow into womanhood and see who they become. I want to roam from Starfall to the Tor, with no keep nor lands nor people of my own to worry over. I want to have children of my own, I want to watch them play in the Water Gardens without worrying some assassin might bash their heads against a wall."
"Claiming a dragon seems rather at odds with those humble desires." Deziel's voice was flat; he still looked at the olive tree, not Olyvar.
"It doesn't have to be. When word came of dragons, Princess Elia saw two paths Daenerys might take. Either she might support my claim to the throne, or she might slay us all and claim the throne herself. But there is another path, another way. Aerys was slain, his line deposed. The maesters might say my claim comes before Daenerys, but either of us would have to claim the throne by conquest, as Robert Baratheon did. She has spent her life yearning to return to Westeros, and since she hatched her dragons she has planned to return a conqueror."
"So?" Deziel did not seem as quick to catch on as Olyvar had hoped.
"So what if she were to take the crown? Dorne wants the Lannisters gone; let Daenerys have the Iron Throne, so long as she proves as sound of mind as she seems thus far."
"Sound of mind?" Deziel's voice was flatter than the bench on which they sat.
"Aerys would have let Ser Jon Connington gut me and then burnt the rest of us alive, not sent Ser Barristan to save me from her own knight. We have been treated as honored guests—"
Deziel snorted. "You're too easily impressed. A year she's ruled Meereen, and so far as I can tell half the ruling is being done by her pretty husband."
"As if Robert Baratheon did any ruling himself. I'm not saying we should acclaim her Queen of the Seven Kingdoms tomorrow," Olyvar said waspishly. There weren't seven kingdoms anyway, not with Robb Stark holding three of them as King of the North, Trident, and the Vale. "We should watch her closely, consider her methods and her judgment."
"A crown practically falls in your lap, and you seek to cast it at the feet of a girl you barely know? Aegon—"
"Don't." Somehow Olyvar's hands were balled into fists. "Don't call me that. My name is Olyvar. That's why I didn't tell you when I should have. You are the only person close to me who did not know, but it was because I did not want to lose our brotherhood!" He swallowed, trying to slow down. "Everything else has changed so quickly, I could not bear for our friendship to change. What I said, about fear and flattery, that was a poor excuse, the first one that occurred to me."
Deziel turned to look at him, his eyebrows raised in disbelief. "Olyvar—" For a moment Deziel clutched his face in his hands, as he did when too frustrated to speak. "I did not truly think you meant what you said, but it hurt nonetheless. For Seven's sake, you must think before you say things!"
Olyvar blanched, suddenly transported to a cool night in the Water Gardens and his mother's long delayed scolding for daring to fight the Mountain. "What else could I do?" he had asked, frustrated. Tears were in his mother's eyes as she answered, her voice somehow calm and furious all at once. "You could think! Think of the consequences of your actions, you cannot afford to be as reckless as your father—"
"Olyvar?"
He was standing; how had that happened? He did not remember rising to his feet. Every nerve in his body tingled, his mind racing. Am I truly so thoughtless? No better than Rhaegar or the Kingslayer?
"The tree is from Leng," Olyvar made himself say, pointing at the dwarf juniper. "A Lengii gardener is to come tomorrow to explain how it must be cared for. If you will pray excuse me, I have much to think on."
Deziel nodded, his brows creased with either anger, concern, or both, and with a stiff bow Olyvar took his leave. His strides were long and angry as he descended the pyramid; by the time he reached the hall of muddy yellow brick on the third level he could already feel the slickness of sweat beneath his arms.
The hall rang with the sound of clacking wood and clashing metal, the cacophany no different than that of any training yard that could be found in Westeros. Pairs of squires drilled with sword and spear, following the familiar pattern of low, high, low, low, high. Ser Barristan strolled among them, his white plate gleaming as he rapped at the hands of those who held their weapons poorly and gently kicked the ankles of those whose stance was weak. He paused longest at the side of a tall boy with a dancer's natural grace, his dark skin polished by sweat as he lunged and parried with impressive speed.
Olyvar walked past the rows of squires, ignoring Ser Barristan's inscrutable gaze. His own squire stood at the far end of the hall, a blunted tourney sword grasped in his hand as he awaited Perros Blackmont's attack.
"Stop leaning forward," Brienne of Tarth said brusquely as Olyvar drew near. "If you overbalance you might as well skewer yourself and save Edric the bother." Perros nodded, apparently used to her exasperation.
"Like this?" Rather than standing straight and tall, his feet rooted under him, Perros overcorrected, leaning away from his opponent.
"Gods, boy, no," Ser Gulian Qorgyle groaned from his place against the wall.
"I told you, woman," said Ser Symon Wyl, who leaned against the wall beside Ser Gulian. "He's as well suited for knighthood as a quill is for stabbing."
"Quills are sharp!" Perros protested, shifting his feet as Brienne pushed his back and shoulders into a better position. He raised his sword higher, muttering something under his breath. Probably the pattern of the drill, Olyvar thought as Perros finally stepped forward. His cuts lacked the easy rhythm of Edric's, as though he had to think before each move.
"How is Princess Sansa?" Olyvar asked when Brienne stepped back, content to let them go at it. Squires never learned if their master hovered too much.
"Still sick to her stomach, ser. The princess lies abed, picking at a tray of bland food, playing with Kit and Sylva while Gilly points at things and names them in northron. Lady Toland and Lady Jynessa are with her too, talking over their needlework."
"No Nym or Jennelyn?"
"Out riding, ser, with several men-at-arms. Edric! Use your whole body, not just your arm."
Edric turned red, and Brienne turned back to Olyvar. "Lady Nym heard that the pyramid of Merreq once boasted the finest hunting birds this side of the Narrow Sea, and nothing would do but she investigate such claims."
"The Ghiscari claim to have invented hawking," Olyvar vaguely remembered.
He seriously doubted Nym and Jenn were interested in buying hawks; Lord Fowler was so insistent on the proud tradition of hawking that one would think he was born in the mews. His heir Jeyne liked the sport well enough, but her twin Jennelyn despised it with a burning passion. More likely they were in some inn near the pyramid of Merreq, doing gods knew what in a private room while one man-at-arms guarded the door and the rest ate a fine meal in the tavern below.
"So does House Whitehead of the Weeping Town. That's why their sigil is a hawk with a white head." Brienne was no scholar like Perros, but she knew the legends of the Stormlands well enough; on the rare occasions that she overcame her shyness he had heard her tell Princess Sansa stories from her home, tales of dashing heroes like Ser Galladon of Morne, the Perfect Knight, a man of such valor that the Maiden herself gave him a sword.
Olyvar sighed as he watched the squires hack at each other. Perfect knights didn't try to forget their troubled thoughts with a vicious spar. Besides, Ser Gulian and Ser Symon had already returned to sparring with each other, and Brienne was busy watching the squires. A few words of advice and encouragement to Edric, and he took his leave.
Lacking any better idea, he began climbing the pyramid. Each level was built with a different shade of brick; he climbed past a green so deep it almost looked black, past an orange as bright as poppies, past dandelion yellow and apple green. For a moment he paused on the level of ash grey brick, glancing down the hall that led to his chambers. Turning away, he resumed his climb. The twenty-ninth level was azure blue, the thirtieth faded ivory, the thirty-first vivid scarlet. It was there that he paused, taking deep lungfuls of air as his legs protested all the climbing of the past two days.
The queen kept her council chambers on this floor, Olyvar vaguely remembered as he glimpsed a pair of elaborately carved mahogany doors, their long handles of beaten silver. He could climb no higher, not unless he wished to visit the queen's audience hall or her private chambers. But there were doors aplenty lining the long passageway, each carved from a different rare wood. Only one was ajar, letting in a draft of sweet air that danced and swirled down the passageway.
Olyvar nudged the door open, the hinges creaking unhappily. The room was a broad square, lined with bookshelves so tall they reached the ceiling, filled with scrolls and parchments and tomes so thick a man would need two hands to hold it. Over a dozen volumes stuck out at awkward angles, as if someone had made to pull them down before thinking better of it. The closest was written in Valyrian glyphs, and he eyed it uncomprehending. If Jynessa and Perros knew little, Olyvar knew less. To his eye one character resembled the symbol for thought, but he could tell no more than that.
"Who goes there?" A voice called in smooth High Valyrian. Olyvar turned toward the sound, toward the terrace which was the source of the sweet breeze. He saw no one, only fruit trees encircling an oblong pool so long he could not see the end of it.
"Who goes there?" The voice called again, once more in High Valyrian, once in the Common Tongue. Few enough spoke the Common Tongue within the pyramid, but he thought he knew that voice.
Taking a deep breath, Olyvar stepped out onto the terrace.
Young Griff floated in the far end of the pool, arms rising and falling steadily as he treaded water. Sunlight glinted on the fine silver hair that fell to his shoulders; his pale bare chest was as hairless as the angular lines of his jaw.
"Oh," Young Griff said, his face falling. "You."
Olyvar stared for a moment, unsure of what to say. Think, he scolded himself, his mother's voice echoing along with Deziel's.
"The day is hot," he said, glancing up at the sun. Weather was always a safe way to begin. "May I join you?"
"Suit yourself," Young Griff shrugged. With that he dove beneath the water, graceful as a merling as he swum from one end of the pool to the other. A marble bench sat at one end of the pool; it was there that Olyvar laid his clothes, everything but the clout he wore about his hips.
Olyvar felt rather self-conscious as he approached the pool. His own chest bore dark hairs too thick to be called a dusting and too sparse to be called a pelt. Angry red pimples dotted the tops of his shoulders and the back of his neck, and his left forearm was covered in mottled scars where the Mountain had tried to crush his arm.
Young Griff was still doing laps. Olyvar joined him, letting the water caress him as he rose up and down through the gentle waves created in Young Griff's wake as the man swam faster and faster. Olyvar did not try to catch him, nor attempt to match his urgent pace. There was something meditative about swimming, the simple repetition of movement required to glide through the water. He was so lost in the stroke that he almost failed to notice when Young Griff halted, rising from the pool to stand beneath the fruit trees.
Olyvar paused, resting his arms on the edge of the pool. There were at least a dozen well-tended trees, but Young Griff only approached three of them, returning to the pool with a ripe green pear, a deep purple fig, and a pomegranate so red it almost hurt the eyes. Silently Young Griff set them in a row on the ledge around the pool, then slid back into the water, where he stood, the water rippling about his shoulders.
"I don't know which one I want," Young Griff said suddenly, his gaze fixed on the fruit as though Olyvar was not there. "Dany would know in an instant."
"I suppose?" Olyvar ventured, bewildered. He had no idea what sort of food Daenerys favored, or why such preferences were worthy of discussion.
"All my life, every day, every moment, I was told I had a path. A long road, a hard road, but one paved by destiny, with a crown and a throne at the end. Now..."
"An open field, with no paths to be found," Olyvar said softly.
Young Griff turned, his shoulders slumping, his indigo eyes bloodshot as if he had been weeping. "Illyrio Mopatis arrived this morning." He cupped the pomegranate in his palm, a thumb rubbing the soft skin. "With pretty words and prettier promises, and wedding gifts so costly they would bankrupt a Lannister. Even when I told him I knew I was not Aegon Targaryen, he barely flinched."
Young Griff set the pomegranate back on the ledge. "Aegor Blackfyre was the name my mother gave me. Serra Rivers, granddaughter of Bittersteel and his Blackfyre wife, Calla. Serra was eleven when Ser Barristan slew Maelys the Monstrous and the Fifth Rebellion failed. She was hiding with her mother in Lys, fearful Maelys might force one of them to wed him. Barbra Rivers was past childbearing age, but still well loved by many of the exiles; Serra was far too young, but already a startling beauty. It served her well when a pox took her mother some years later. A courtesan took her under her wing, and for a while Serra lived in luxury, Lyseni lords hopping to her whims."
"Mopatis found her when she was two-and-twenty. For a year or two she warmed his bed, but in the end he loved her so much that he wed her." Young Griff made a face of disgust, skeptical of the romantic tale. "For years they tried to have children. Serra dreamed of Westeros, of Stone Hedge where her grandfather grew up, of the Red Keep and the Iron Throne so cruelly stolen from her great-grandsire, Daemon Blackfyre. At last, after years of trying, she bore a healthy son. Me. Within the year she was dead, taken by the grey death."
With the swiftness of a serpent Young Griff whirled, flinging the pomegranate into the open sky.
"I remember growing up in Illyrio's manse. I lived there until I was six, when I was entrusted to Ser Jon Connington as his page." His mouth twisted. "I was always tall for my age, but it turns out that's because I was actually eight, two years older than the prince they claimed I was. Two years of my life, erased by my own father so that he could claim I was another man's son."
"What did Daenerys think of this?" Olyvar asked softly. Surely his wife was a better confidant than the stranger who bore the identity Young Griff once thought was his.
"I haven't spoken to her yet. The council was in session all day, and she went to bed a few hours ago because her back ached so badly she could barely walk."
Young Griff picked up the pear, scraping the tender skin with his nail. "I want to rant and rave and scream, but Illyrio was so, so calm, so reasonable. How many men would tell their son such a lie? To deny him his own family, his own identity?"
"My mother did."
Young Griff flinched, then scowled. "Oh, poor you," he sneered, scathing. "You thought you were a bastard, now you're the rightful heir to the Iron Throne. Such a tale of woe! My heart bleeds buttermilk. I thought I was the heir to the Iron Throne, the rightful king." His grip tightened, crushing the pear until juice dripped from between his fingers. "Instead I am the heir of a line of failed usurpers, the son of a Pentoshi magister infamous for his depravity and greed."
"Have you ever seen the Iron Throne?"
"How in the Seven Hells would I have seen the Iron Throne?" Young Griff demanded. "I've never set foot in Westeros!"
Olyvar bit back a sarcastic retort. "I meant perhaps in books. Many histories of Westeros bear illuminations of Targaryen kings upon the throne."
"Oh." Young Griff tossed the ruined pear under a shrub. "A few. Tall and gleaming, a monument to the Conqueror's might, beautiful despite the danger it poses to unworthy kings."
"It is not beautiful," Olyvar said. "It is a chaotic mess, a jumble of blades half-melted together, an unnatural monster that devours any fool who sits upon it. If you draw close you can see bloodstains here and there; most of the swords are dull, covered in patches of rust and grime. No man would choose to sit there unless he had no other choice."
"You... are not what I expected." Young Griff seemed more confused than angry as he examined Olyvar. "I was taught that after Daeron the Second brought them into the realm Dorne was ever loyal to the Iron Throne. Martells married the Targaryens thrice."
"After a hundred and fifty years of losing our people to Targaryen blades, yes. We did not have enough people to resist any longer. Before the Conquest we could field sixty thousand spears; now we are lucky if we can raise half as many." Olyvar could almost taste the bitterness of that lesson in his mouth. "The dragons may have scorched our keeps, but they turned our fields and orchards into cinders."
"Long ago," Young Griff objected. "Great Uncle—" he winced "—Ser Lewyn Martell of the Kingsguard brought the strength of Dorne to the Trident."
"Because Aerys had my mother and her feigned babes, not because he wanted to. Were Princess Elia in Dorne when the rebellion began, Prince Doran would have called his banners for the rebels, so long as they were willing to place me on the throne when Aerys and Rhaegar were dead."
"A throne you don't want." Young Griff laughed bitterly, tossing the fig from one hand to the other.
"How did Illyrio Mopatis react to that? To hearing of my claim?"
Young Griff stopped tossing the fig, his face grave. "I didn't breathe a word about you, nor will Dany nor anyone else. Illyrio Mopatis would have you poisoned within the hour, and give your corpse the most lavish funeral in living memory while consoling your widow like a doting grandfather."
"Oh." Olyvar missed being a bastard. It was nice living a life where no one wanted to kill him.
"How was visiting Viserion yesterday?"
Olyvar winced. "Not good. He's gravely injured from his imprisonment."
"The queen will want to know immediately." Young Griff pulled himself out of the pool and began toweling himself off with impressive speed. "Come on, ser, are you a man or a tortoise?"
"I'm confused," Olyvar replied as he left the pool. "Why such urgency? You said she was abed, sick."
"Those dragons are her children, as much as the freedmen of Meereen. She will want to know. I'll follow in a moment."
Daenerys was not abed when her little herald admitted him to her chambers, telling the massive eunuch called Strong Belwas to step aside. She was in a copper tub filled with water so hot it steamed, a thin cloth draped over the tub so nothing showed but her head and neck.
"I hope your back feels better, Your Grace," Olyvar began.
"It does not, but thank you," Daenerys said, voice thick with pain. "Did you visit Viserion yesterday as you intended?"
"I did, Your Grace."
"How is my child?"
Something must have shown in his face; Daenerys' eyes turned anxious before he even opened his mouth.
"His imprisonment has injured him, Your Grace. His collar is too tight; it chokes his breath." Telling a pregnant woman about skin growing over iron and the stink of a festering wound seemed unnecessary.
"Irri!" Daenerys called, grimacing in obvious discomfort as she sat up.
"Are you well?" The queen's face was covered in sweat; by force of habit Olyvar pressed a hand to her brow. "You're burning with fever."
"Never mind that," Daenerys insisted as her lady brought over a bedrobe. Heedless of her modesty she stood, tossing aside the cloth which had covered the tub. "An upset stomach and a little dizziness, that's all—"
"Khaleesi!" The Dothraki lady gasped.
The tub's water was red as blood.
"I'm fine," Daenerys said, swaying. Olyvar and Irri caught her as she fell, one under each of the queen's slim arms.
"I'm fine," she insisted, her eyes fixed firmly ahead, not seeing the dark red river that trickled from between her legs.
"Get Maester Perceval," Olyvar said, unable to keep the panic from his voice as Daenerys sagged against him, whimpering. "On our level, third door from the steps."
"She needs a healer," Irri replied, fear in her dark eyes.
"He is a healer, now run!"
She ran.
Mother, help her, he prayed. Daenerys was tiny in his arms, helpless, a child. Please, don't let it be too late.
Wooo! Happy with this chapter; can't wait to hear what y'all think!
NOTES
1) Please behold, courtesy of PurpleMuffin: https/youtu.be/V011utz00mQ the weirwood queen fic, but with ~vines~ aka the greatest thing I've ever seen.
2) On a much less happy note, poor Viserion. I was horrified when I realized that in this timeline, he's been imprisoned for a year. Holy fucking shit. He's mentioned to wear an iron collar, and he's mentioned to grow while in the pit. Hence, the embedded collar. Jesus christ. Do NOT google pictures of that!
3) I chose a juniper bonsai because varieties of juniper are native to both Spain and Japan.
4) In the canon worldbook A World of Ice and Fire, if Yi Ti is basically China in a paper-thin costume, Leng is a very weird mishmash of Japan (they have god-empresses and are extremely isolationist), Korea (they have been repeatedly conquered by Yi Ti and the cultures have influenced each other), and Southeast Asia (they have thick jungles filled with rare spices, tigers, monkeys, and apes). Also, this fun quotation:
"The native Lengii are perhaps the tallest of all the known races of mankind, with many men amongst them reaching seven feet in height, and some as tall as eight. Long-legged and slender, with flesh the color of oiled teak, they have large golden eyes and can supposedly see farther and better than other men, especially at night. Though formidably tall, the women of the Lengii are famously lithe and lovely, of surpassing beauty."
...yeah, I hate it. I'm leaning more toward Japan with the excuse that AWOIAF was supposedly compiled by maesters and is thereby deeply flawed and inaccurate within Westeros and even more bullshit (and so racist, jfc, so goddamn racist) beyond it.
5) I chose fig, pomegranate, and pear trees on purpose. In Buddhist tradition Buddha reached enlightenment while meditating under a bodhi (fig) tree. In Ancient Egypt pomegranates symbolized ambition; in many, many other countries they are associated with fertility. Finally, in China pears are associated with immortality, but they are not given as gifts because the word for 'pears' (梨 lí ) sounds just like the word for leaving (离 lí), which implies the connotation of separation.
6) Bittersteel family tree!
Calla Blackfyre —— Aegor Rivers (Bittersteel)
186 AC 172 AC-241 AC
\/
Barbra Bittersteel
221 AC
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Serra Bittersteel —— Illyrio Mopatis
249 AC. 251 AC
\/
Aegor Blackfyre (Young Griff)
280 AC
7) Odd though it seems, severe back pain is apparently one possibly warning sign of an imminent miscarriage. Poor Rhaella and poor Dany.