Chapter 4: Jaehaerys II (Part 1)
This is an alternate-timeline work inspired by GRRM's A Song of Ice and Fire world
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Jaehaerys II "the Smiling" (128-175AC, r.143-172AC)
"All schismatics are to cease and desist, or they shall learn what sort of protection the wise king Jaehaerys, rider of Vermithor, promised to the Faith."
- Jaehaerys II Targaryen, from "The Pacific Edict" issued during the Redfish Schism
King Jaehaerys Targaryen the Second of His Name was the eighth and penultimate King of the Seven Kingdoms to reign from the Iron Throne. Raised to the kingship by forces he could not control, the king would continue to suffer as a prisoner in a gilded cage before seizing his chance to break his chains of gold and velvet. Still, family issues haunted his reign persistently, and threaten the unity of his realm even after his death.
Appearance and character
Jaehaerys possessed traditional Targaryen features, the pale golden hair, the violet eyes, fair skin, and the almost otherworldly magical aura that made dragonseeds so commonplace on the island of Dragonstone, a charisma he did not let lay idle. He kept his face clean shaven. Unlike his predecessors, he wore the Valyrian steel crown of Aegon the Conqueror. At least according to his known lovers, the king was quite attractive, charming, and witty, though he had a distaste for most indoor spaces, a distaste which also dictated his choice of clothing, resulting in a wardrobe almost entirely geared toward the outdoors. Like his mother, Jaehaerys' colors were black and gold - the gold this time representing his dragon, Vermithor, whose scales glinted gold in the sun.
An active child, Jaehaerys was troubled by the intrigues of his youth, which often saw him confined to narrow spaces such as his bedroom. Unable to understand what was going on, these childhood experiences left a lasting scar on his mind, and reconstruction from surviving sources suggest the king suffered from severe claustrophobia. Whereas his mother left the Red Keep on shows of power and his brother repeatedly flew off to war, Jaehaerys lived almost entirely beyond the castle's confines during his reign, preferring the open road and tents to sturdy stone. The sheer size of the throne room made it more tolerable, so it was usually there the king could be found when he was back at the Red Keep. He barely used the royal apartments at Maegor's Holdfast.
At the beginning of his reign, Jaehaerys was hailed as "the Wise King born again", but such praise quickly died out after he claimed the reins of power for himself. It was not his wisdom that his men lost faith in - it was the callous ambition that drove the wisdom, like a haunting flame dancing behind his mesmerizing violet eyes, which alienated his supporters. Jaehaerys was fond of doing things that he claimed, 'must be done', even if these actions may lead to questionable situations, such as legitimizing blood sacrifice to a limited degree.
He still did try to emulate the Wise King whenever possible, though, aware that at least trying to be like the first Jaehaerys could legitimize his rule a lot, especially amongst his bannermen beyond the crownlands. He was noted as an adult for his attempts to be good at horse-riding, but unlike the Old King, he never could ride a horse well enough to lead a cavalry charge.
While not a good horseman - passable, but not good - the king's itinerant lifestyle made his choice of riding attire somewhat of a fashion marker amongst his bannermen. Tight riding breeches were popularized as not merely functional wear, but a competition of sorts where lords and ladies attempted to outdo each other with displays of wealth, design taste and shapely legs. Leading the flow of fashion, King Jaehaerys wore various black leather breeches with gold threads woven into the material, forming images depicting the many exploits of his ancestors. Also due to his time out in the open, he developed a slight tan later in life.
Not as powerfully built as his brother, Jaehaerys was nevertheless still significantly stronger than most men by virtue of dragonblood, able to knock weapons out of the hands of his sparring opponents with one hit, achieving by sheer strength what his mediocre swordsmanship could not - and on the battlefield, such strength combined with Blackfyre made quick work of any foe. Epidemic diseases and changes in the weather also did not trouble him much, and he could go for a moon sleeping only four hours a day. Though fierce and courageous in single combat, the king suffered from a crippling inability to even stand amongst an army for extended periods of time, which rendered him unable to command in person, so he often left the task of command to his generals and chose to lead by example in battle instead, unaware flying on dragonback was a difficult example to follow.
The King's defining trait was his permanent, inscrutable, and disarmingly handsome smile, a mask that served to cover his true thoughts and intentions, giving his face a divine charm, sticking even when he schemed the deaths of thousands, fought amidst battle and killed people with his own hands. Reportedly, seeing the smiling king in person made people stupidly pliable to his suggestions, and its effects only wore off when they left his presence. The smile was with him ever since he was raised to the throne, and lasted to the end of his reign - some would say it was still there when the dethroned king died. Jaehaerys also had an unsettling sense of humor bordering on the macabre.
Unlike his brother Aegon's turbulent and ultimately fatal relationship with Dreamfyre, Jaehaerys' relationship with Vermithor was amicable despite the Bronze Fury's flaming temperament, notably fierce even amongst dragons. The Dragonkeepers claim Vermithor was 'almost tame' when the king was around.
Perhaps due to the influence of his father's blood, Jaehaerys did not age as badly as his grandfather Viserys did. He retained, till the end of his life, a lean and combat-ready physique.
History
Youth
While hailed as 'the best of both worlds' after he became his own master, as a boy Prince Jaehaerys was often compared to his elder brothers unfavorably, his book knowledge not a match for Maekar's erudition, and his swordsmanship was utterly pathetic compared to Aegon, commentators cheerfully ignoring their age difference. This was the result of a series of events, beginning with a succession crisis that was a natural consequence of his birth.
Jaehaerys was conceived after his mother's ascension, whereas his twin brothers were conceived before that. This led to a delicate question: as his brothers were sons of the late king, should Rhaenyra's reign be seen as a de jure regency for Viserys' sons, or should Jaehaerys be appointed heir instead, to cement Viserys' will which chose her as heir? Beyond the arcane demands of jurisprudence, forces at court were already mobilizing in preparation for the inevitable power struggle that would follow - it did involve the imminent question of whether Queen Rhaenyra should step down once Prince Maekar of Dragonstone reached his majority.
It was not that Rhaenyra had not prepared her sons, bolstered their positions in face of stormy situations. Prince Maekar, then heir apparent, was betrothed to Baela Targaryen, his paternal cousin, and more importantly granddaughter of Corlys Velaryon the "Sea Snake". Sunfyre's rider was in a far less precarious position than his mother would have been if Viserys married again and had a son, but allying her crown prince to the richest man in Westeros did cost the Queen considerable political capital. The Lord of the Tides was a haughty and ambitious man who alienated many at court, and over time men had rallied under the banner of morality and justice against the tyrannical corruption of Lord Corlys. But a man who could keep the peace on the seas to maintain trade which funded Rhaenyra's construction projects had earned himself a permanent position within her court, for attacks from upright men upon his character could not fill the royal treasury.
To protect her infant son from all the scheming and a potential kidnapping by his own father in some coup d'état, Prince Jaehaerys was raised from an early age by one of Rhaenyra's most trusted eunuchs, a Lyseni named Prūbrepȳdes. The eunuch would be fondly remembered by his ward later in life, and absolutely hated by the same boy in his youth, for he kept the prince under tight supervision and mostly confined to his bedchamber. The necessities of such measures stemmed from the fact forces which wished to do ill to the boy had infiltrated as far as the Red Keep itself, an unfortunate fact Prince Jaehaerys was unaware of at the time. Aside from his role as guardian, the eunuch would - under the queen's orders, too - ensure the prince had a culturally balanced education, or as he liked to put it, "between Andal and Valyrian". Since not all of his tutors were trusted enough to go into the prince's chamber, the most Prince Jaehaerys saw of the Red Keep asides from his own room was the royal library, where the prince and his boy companions would learn from the tutor under supervision from a court eunuch. It was rumored his future interest in blood magic started in those early days, when he wandered among the shelves holding books regarding ancient Valyria during recess.
Jaehaerys was occasionally allowed to go out into the training grounds, where he earned the ridicule of the warriors who practiced there, for they thought him a pathetic comparison to Prince Aegon in terms of skill at arms, but Jaehaerys was so strong skill was optional, like it was for Aegon - his elder brother was just also quite talented when learning the skills of wielding a weapon, a talent his younger brother did not share. Despite his poor combat skill progress, the boy was a merry bundle of energy every time he appeared and did not pause practicing unless he was listening to instructions or injured, so the men-at-arms of the Red Keep came to love him, even as they continued to laugh at the pale, bumbling prince.
While Maekar remained distantly respectful and Aegon tried to help his little brother on the training field but stayed away from him as much as possible outside of it, Aemma was the sibling Jaehaerys grew most deeply attached to, even though she was betrothed to their elder brother Aegon. She was one of the few people at court even her brother's guardian tiger trusted not to hurt him, and her presence was one that guaranteed to light up the young prince. Jaehaerys was willing to tell his sister anything, and often cried in her embrace when asking why he was shut inside his room for so long. The siblings eventually grew so close that the princess was once caught trying to steal books from the forbidden section of the royal library, because she thought the books there might be more interesting and could help her brother fight his woes in isolation better. Aemma did manage to bring a forbidden book to Jaehaerys later - and it was An Introduction to Blood Magic. The book would send the king down a path that left scars on both sides of the Narrow Sea.
Prince Maekar's decision to renounce his worldly powers and inheritance - the motives behind which were a subject of eternal mystery - drastically complicated the matter of succession. The Queen's own, led by Lotanquo, began to start rumors ridiculing the youngest Targaryen to shore up Prince Aegon's shaky status as heir. If Jaehaerys was seen as the impossible option for royal power, then no matter what Aegon's marriage connections were, his position was still secure - at least, that was how Lotanquo would defend himself later, claiming it was all for the good of the realm. Never mind the truth behind Lotanquo's claims, Jaehaerys' primary supporter was his own unpopular father King Daemon, and he had no betrothed, which meant no political allies, so in terms of political capital he already was the impossible option.
Jaehaerys found himself in deeper trouble after the Queen's last flight to Dragonstone and his brother's rise. Caught up in the chaos caused by Sers Hightower and Penrose, in its aftermath he fell under house arrest and was closely monitored by agents of the eunuch Efretar, who had become one of his brother's closest allies. Many, including the prince's old guardian Prūbrepȳdes, still pitied the boy prince, and they connected in secret to give Jaehaerys a chance at dragon taming. The 11-year-old did not let them down: in the dead of the night, he claimed the mount of his namesake, the golden-brown dragon Vermithor "the Bronze Fury", referring to the color of its scales and its legendary temper. The fact was kept a secret, and during his brother's reign Jaehaerys did not see much of Vermithor. It was all his supporters could do, for no one could predict what the king's response would be if he learned his younger brother and greatest rival had also claimed a dragon of his own. With his closest companions keeping their distance and solitude as his only company, Jaehaerys passed his brother's reign confined to a windowless room atop the White Sword Tower, not too much unlike his younger years.
Efretar the Kingmaker
King Aegon's death during the Hellholt campaign, at the jaws of his own dragon was a hasty, messy, and unexpected affair. When he died, his infant sons were still with their mother in Dorne, as she insisted on raising them personally, assisted by tutors selected by the king. Neither did the king prepare for such an emergency, perhaps because there was no way to. Aegon had relied on his own prowess and combat history to keep the captains his mother left him with in check, and there was no way a mere infant could fight and inspire loyalty the way he did.
In blatant defiance of the king's inheritance commands, instead of bringing the infant Prince Aegon "the Martell" from Sunspear to King's Landing, Efretar lead the retribution force which had pulverized Helholt directly back to the Red Keep and called the small council to meet and discuss the succession. It was decided that the council shall not obey the king's political testament, and elect Prince Jaehaerys as the next king. Already during this time, Lady Paramount Aliandra was sending letters to protest the council's theft of the throne from her son, but her demands to restore Prince Aegon's rightful inheritance were denied. It is unknown what strings Efretar pulled to stop a Great Council from being called to settle the matter, but that he did have strings to pull was evidenced by the sudden change of Riverrun's attitude regarding the succession. Lord Kermit, like Lady Aliandra, had declared support for Prince Aegon, but a mere week later his position flipped and backed the "Wise King come again" instead.
It may seem unreasonable that an ambitious figure like Efretar would support Jaehaerys' claim instead of putting an infant puppet king on the Iron Throne, but an idea as preposterous as Efretar could just dictate who gets to be king could only come from someone ignorant of the other powerbrokers in the capital. The Inspector-Pacificant may wield the most power amongst the mortals of King's Landing, but on dragons' back the Targaryens were literal gods among men. King Daemon and Dowager Queen Aemma were both stiffly resistant to the idea of placing an infant on the Iron Throne, and it's not like Efretar could convince Caraxes and Silverwing otherwise. Aside from his father and sister, there were other factions in play, whose support for Jaehaerys would prove instrumental for his ascension.
Prūbrepȳdes had also risen to Chief of the Royal Secretariat during Aegon II's reign despite his long history with Prince Jaehaerys, and now threw his full backing behind the prince, whom he had always believed innocent in the failed coup of 138. Already pressured from the outside by the dragonlords, remaining resistance to Jaehaerys' rise among the small council and the lords of the realm buckled when Prūbrepȳdes took his stand, for he could send trade throughout the Seven Kingdoms grinding to a halt if they did not give in. The power of the pen was sometimes surprisingly powerful, which was further demonstrated by Tornik's role in pushing through Jaehaerys' election - the manager of the royal estates wrote a list of the benefits and privileges the Citadel enjoyed under patronage of the Iron Throne to the Conclave when rumors they were sending ravens to garner support for Septon Maekar reached his ears. The entire affair was dealt with peacefully and quietly.
The final session of the small council set up a power structure that left most power in Efretar's hands - as Inspector-Pacificant he held general command of the royal men-at-arms, and as regent of the crown he acquired the administrative power to influence all members of the small council. Never before had a eunuch gained so much power in any Westerosi state, and as the one who dominated the councils that led to this result, the leading figures at the Red Keep all accepted that before Jaehaerys' majority, true power should lay in the hands of Efretar, whose fame as "the Kingmaker" had already started to spread. Indeed, Efretar was the first to hail the king as "King Jaehaerys the Second of His Name, King of the Valyrians, the Andals, the Rhoynar and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, Protector of the Realm" after Dowager Queen Aemma crowned her brother Jaehaerys as king 3 weeks after the death of their elder brother, a role which marked just how powerful the Inspector-Pacificant had become. In return for his support, Efretar shall be named the king's very first Hand in Jaehaerys' very first royal edict - even the king's marriage announcement to his widowed sister came second.
Having gained somewhat more freedom with his brother dead, King Jaehaerys continued to immerse himself in books, sometimes flying away from King's Landing on Vermithor's back, pretending that he did not notice Efretar's further ambitions nor mind being relegated to ceremonial roles, entrusting the governance of state to Efretar, whose power stretched across much of the central government and armies of the Seven Kingdoms. This curious relationship between the 2 men was the result of the delicate circumstances surrounding King Aegon's death and succession.
A brief note on House Targaryen members just after the death of King Aegon
Queen Aemma, Princess Viserra and King Jaehaerys lived at King's Landing; King Daemon and Princess Baela's household resided on Dragonstone; Princess Rhaena married Lord Arthor Celtigar of Crab Castle and lived there with her husband and child; Princes Aegon and Qoren lived at Sunspear with their lady mother; Septon Maekar still held his post as Septon of Brightwater, but flies across the westerlands and the Reach to perform special actions intended to hold the Faith together.
Maesters' Plot and Dual Monarchy
However, such a relationship was not bound to last. Jaehaerys was already fifteen, and the young dragon chafed at the increasing restrictions imposed on himself while Efretar moved to extend his regency for the king. In the confines of Maegor's Holdfast, the puppet king plotted, allying with his sister and eunuchs aligned with the royal siblings to find an opening. What they found as their opening was a matter of monumental importance, one which would continue to influence the king's future policies even after his coup d'état.
Efretar understood that the power of eunuchs lay in their ability to be reliable agents of the king's will, or at least the ability to pretend they are such agents. However, there was a caveat to this statement: one must be considering normal human politics, not dragonlords. While the Targaryens cannot do without cooperation from other people to build a political structure, they had absolutely no need of anyone else if they wanted to just burn things to the ground, including eunuchs who got too ambitious. Castles, armies, knights: none of those could stand against the wrath of a dragon, unless one happens to have scorpions or sufficiently powerful magic at hand. Aware of his predicament, Maester Helman invited the Kingmaker to join the maesters' plot of killing all the Targaryen dragons, to bring the royal house down to earth and more predictable. Having found common ground with the maesters, Efretar joined the plot and soon gave them long-coveted access to the Dragonpit, access denied for so long by the late King Aegon. Not even the Dragonkeepers understood the tests and trials the maesters attempted to do upon the dragons, but they kept their watch, and recorded the names and appearances of the maesters who entered to commit their unspeakable experiments.
Already actively scheming to empower his ward, however, Prūbrepȳdes soon discovered damning proof regarding Efretar's betrayal of House Targaryen. Provided with the letters of the plotters from his past guardian and staunch loyalist, the king secretly summoned the Dragonkeepers to arrest Efretar on account of his treason. Leading the charge in person, Jaehaerys, Queen Aemma and the Dragonkeepers fought their way into the throne room and captured Efretar - who was sitting atop the Iron Throne, holding Blackfyre while he listened to the petitions of the lords and handled the daily affairs of state - before he could escape and summon the troops under his command, while the Tiger Eunuch claimed the rookery for his former ward with the palace eunuchs under his command. The king then went to the royal barracks and announced Efretar's treachery, the soldiers' rage at the maesters' plot and Efretar being part of it restoring the king's control over what was only nominally his troops - naturally, the king's declaration that since they had no knowledge of the plot, they would not be held responsible, helped smooth the process. The next day, Jaehaerys read aloud the old eunuch general's crimes again, then beheaded Efretar with Blackfyre in front of the small council and the captains of his men-at-arms. Grand Maester Munkun, whose part in the plot was never certain, still chose to resign due to the situation, and the post remained vacant for a time.
Appointing a series of loyal eunuchs to replace Efretar and his banished co-conspirators - most of whom then died mysteriously on their way - Jaehaerys and Aemma left them with the daily affairs of government while the siblings discussed how their reign should proceed. Whatever had passed between the siblings was lost behind closed doors, but we do know the results of their arrangement. In what would later be called the Tridentine Constitution, brother and sister laid out 3 principal principles for their joint reign:
1. House Targaryen had too many dragons and too little members. To solve this issue, it was stipulated for the royal siblings while only children born to Jaehaerys and Aemma were in line for the Iron Throne's succession, marked by the fact only these children could be styled "Prince" or "Princess", both siblings could favor others, with all the children thus born viewed as legitimate Targaryens, entitled to their own castle and dragon;
2. Stepping in to replace the defunct Most Devout, King and Queen declared the teachings of the Faith must follow from a combination of the Seven-Pointed Star itself and the additional edicts (such as the Doctrine of Exceptionalism) delivered during the Wise King's reign - this concept was referred to as Drējor, the True Faith. Any additional teachings the Faith wishes to promote, be it by an interpretation of the above corpi or a new insertion to address a brand new issue, must first be discussed at a holy council convened by the monarch - any septon or septa failing to comply with this command would lead to one being branded Mijetys, or a schismatic (literally "one who is apart"), whose rights and powers as a person of god are thus null and void. The same penalties fall for appointment of important clerics not sanctioned by the monarch, both for the appointer and appointed.
3. The division between the Tegondo Zaldrīzer and the Tegondo Ānogres, a broadcast sent out as far as ships could sail and ravens could fly.
In a pompous ceremony afterwards, King Jaehaerys, with Blackfyre on his belt, granted special powers to Queen Aemma, symbolized by presenting Dark Sister to her with both hands: along with the title "Dāria" (queen), marking the siblings as co-rulers, Queen Aemma gained the power to hold her own court, build a castle and a miniature Dragonpit staffed with Dragonkeepers to manage Silverwing. The knights in black had been reforged with an influx of Essosi recruits starting with Rhaenyra's reign, and their role in Efretar's downfall meant they could be trusted not to involve themselves in the maesters' plot. Work on Aemma's castle began in early 144AC, but she would live by her brother's side in the meantime, going on their first royal progress in the same year. It was done both for political and safety reasons: the Tegondo Ānogres policy ran the risk of painting a huge target on the king and queen's back for the Faceless Men.
While the royal couple was in the west, a coup to assassinate them and declare Septon Maekar as King was crushed by the septon himself, who proceeded to present the heads of Lord Loren Brax and Lord Tybalt Marbrand as heads of the plot. For his loyalty, Maekar was lavished with gifts and honors - there was not much the king and queen could grant their eldest brother politically, for he was not within the bureaucracy nor a noble. Still, the siblings parted on good terms. In the meantime - but with little input from the king himself - the far-flung royal estates and holdings managed with ad hoc institutions were formalized into Dāriālia (singular Dāriālion). This formal system was given a Valyrian name mainly to signify it was now run by managers trained and selected by the Red Keep, and formal.
One of the main tasks of this progress was to pacify the lords shaken by King Aegon's blatant disregard for the High Septon, and to present King Jaehaerys as a king who respects the rights and powers of the lords of the realm, not a sinister figure who dabbles in dark magics to kill people from afar. In this regard, Queen Aemma was successful in making her favorite brother accepted among the lords despite Jaehaerys' known interest in blood magic. With this acceptance, their restructuring of the Faith's central leadership around themselves gained traction, most notably in the Reach, where the local lords had always played an important hand influencing the High Septon and the Most Devout. A letter in Lord Lyonel Tyrell's name did much to defuse Lord Lyonel Hightower's opposition of the policy, or perhaps it was his brother Garmund Hightower's appointment to Septon of King's Landing.
War into Pentos
After king and queen returned from their first royal progress, the first round of sacrifices collected from Essos were also accounted for, King Jaehaerys called upon his armies from his royal camp moving throughout the crownlands and declared war upon the Free City that gave the least: Pentos. It was the most expected outcome, judging by the rates of the underground gambling parlors in King's Landing, and pointing out one definitive reason was simple: between the years 144 and 145, Pentos was at another lull in its power following a lost war against Braavos. When the king announced the Tegondo Ānogres policy, the Pentoshi navy was unable to protect their slave trade ships from being seized by other Free Cities to bolster their own city's offering size.
Jaehaerys made it clear this war would not target the other Free Cities, extracting promises of neutrality from them before stuffing an army at least thirty thousand strong upon ships and sailing for Pentos. Riding with the army and fleet were all the dragonriders House Targaryen could muster for the campaign: the king and queen, their father Daemon, their half-sisters the Princesses Baela and Rhaena Targaryen, Baela's son Kardan of Pentos, and Rhaena's daughter Elena Celtigar. In an age where there was only one dragonlord family left, the mere fact Pentos even tried to resist 7 dragonlords was considerable in and of itself. Still, the magisters attempted to use a force mainly consisted of free companies to hold their city, and the king had already ordered his agents across the sea to discreetly sabotage the city's scorpions. Nobody really doubted how the war would turn out.
Pentoshi resistance quickly collapsed in face of dragonfire and Westerosi soldiers, and the expedition marched east from the city walls. For many of the Andal soldiers in the Westerosi expedition, this was their first sight of Andalos, their ancestral homeland. Order across the army collapsed as the king accepted the surrender of Pentos, letting the mercenaries they employed flee, signing a truce that made it clear the magisters of Pentos recognized they had, as 'children of Valyria', a 'duty of blood' to keep dragon magic alive in the world. The Westerosi army was set loose on a pilgrimage of sorts, with only the First Men and crownlander troops travelling under the dragonlords. Gradually breaking down into small bands based on their region of origin, septons led them across the holy sites mentioned in the Seven-Pointed Star, the most important of which was "Hugor's Hill", the hill where Hugor of the Hill was crowned by the Father with stars. The Westerosi pilgrims soon faced a grievous disaster in the form of a Dothraki khalasar, who looked upon the wandering strangers and saw more slaves. Two thousand Reachmen and rivermen were captured and thousands more slain in the ensuing nomad attack, the survivors fleeing to spread word of the danger.
One of the commanders who first received news of the attack, Ser Oscar Tully, willing to prove his own worth as a commander and warrior, rallied his men and gathered wandering sellswords, forming a large force which pushed into the Velvet Hills, hunting down the Dothraki. The khalasar, laden with slaves and loot, were surprised by his assault and chased off. When they got over the shock and attempted to fight Ser Oscar again, he had already retreated to the safety of dragonlord protection, and the mere sight of Vermithor's shadow scared off the horses. Ser Oscar chose to stay in Essos and keep fighting after most of the Iron Throne's forces pulled back with their toll of offerings extracted from Pentos, and the men that followed him to war were gradually reorganized into a free company. After braving a vicious storm off the coast of Tyrosh, they started calling themselves "the Stormbreakers".
Dragonroads in Westeros
With the offerings so collected, King Jaehaerys began in the 2nd moon of the year 145, the first in a series of many open-air blood magic rituals designed to give the younger dragons under Targaryen control a size boost. The social impact of this attempt may be greater than the failed results of this first experiment: his bannermen, the Citadel, and the remaining structures of the Faith, all criticized him for even preparing such a horrendous act, much less complete it. Unfazed, he addressed the concerns of only one lord: Lord Paramount Rickon Stark, Warden of the North, flying to Winterfell in person, holding a meeting with the man his age behind closed doors. When they emerged, records state Lord Rickon was visibly shaken, but he expressed understanding for the king's atrocities, and swore he shall not declare war upon the Iron Throne over the issue of blood magic. It appeared Lord Stark's opinion was the only one that mattered to the King, for despite other lords still protesting, he ordered the construction of more Valyrian blood temples - ānogria - in the crownlands shortly after he returned to King's Landing and was already planning future blood temples in the riverlands. After taking note of the projected costs, however, the queen advised him to first visit the westerlands to secure funding, given the west was rich with their gold and silver.
Shortly after Lord Rickon swore the Oath of Ice and Fire and the king set off on a royal progress for the westerlands, Princess Baela's husband, a runaway Prince-Elect of Pentos, perished in a storm while returning to Dragonstone. The king, who was visiting the Farmans of Fair Isle with his pregnant queen and other retainers, was alarmed by a panicked Kardan, who had flown his dragon Tessarion at full speed to report that his mother planned to burn Pentos with Moondancer, for she believed the ship his father had boarded was sabotaged by the Pentoshi, as revenge for their defeat against the Iron Throne. King Jaehaerys flew east across the entire continent at full speed to prevent his half-sister from making the Targaryens a truce-breaking house. He ended up staying at Dragonstone for a full month before joining Queen Aemma at Tarbeck Hall. Shortly after, the couple celebrated the birth of their first child in Silverhill, a healthy prince they named Baelon, in late 145. Lord Gedmund Serrett of Silverhill was given the honor of holding the child during the cleansing ritual 7 days after his birth, making Lord Serrett his goodfather. Early in the next year, the King flew off again to Dragonstone to celebrate the birth of another son, whom Princess Baela named Balerion after House Targaryen's most powerful dragon. It is unknown why the king accepted such an ambitious name for his second son - Balerion did infamously kill Aegon the Uncrowned, rightful heir to King Aenys I, after all.
King Jaehaerys dealt with this particular debt to the westerlords in an unprecedented matter: instead of making it a tribute or a loan to the crown, funding for the blood temples was organized into stakes in the brand new "Royal Road Company", and the lords stakeholder would be paid stipends based on income the kingsroad generated, including trade tolls. It was not exactly the Free City fashion of shareholding, but neither were the westerlords Free City powerbrokers, and they needed a different sort of system to maintain House Lannister's priority as Lord Paramount of the West despite not giving the most funding - that distinction belonged to Lord Serrett.
Fresh funding meant fresh construction, occupying quite a lot of the King's attention for the year 146. As probably the only dragonmage in the entire world, King Jaehaerys had to execute the recreated dragonroad construction magic with his own hands, which meant he was out flying around the crownlands replacing great sections of the old kingsroad built by his namesake with the rocks pulled into place by his intended sacrifices, reshaped with a healthy dose of blood and fire to become dragonroads that could last for centuries without any maintenance. However, this imitation of old Valyrian magic was not as reliable as the original: in the second half of the year 146, sudden, inexplicable and disastrous cracking ruined sections of the new dragonroad stretching from King's Landing to Rosby. The royal library not holding any books to answer such anomalies, the king flew off to Lys in the same year to search for more tomes, hoping for an answer.
The search dragged on into 147, forcing the king to buy a villa in Lys to store his assorted collection of artifacts, tomes, and dragon eggs, since a sack strapped to Vermithor's back was hardly the best place to keep such precious items. His eunuch attendants and scribes also lived at what was called by the locals 'the Haunted Villa', for it was one among many that had belonged to the old dragonlords who were killed in Lys just after the Doom of Valyria. Jaehaerys, who paid local fear of the ghosts of slain dragonlords absolutely no heed, purchased the residence. In 148, despite his flight to Qarth still revealing no sure causes for fused stone cracking, the king still sent a gift congratulating the birth of Borros Targaryen, son of Queen Aemma and Ser Olyvar Baratheon. Ser Olyvar was dispatched by his cousin Lord Royce to bring gifts from Storm's End to King's Landing to celebrate Prince Baelon's second name-day, and the young knight caught the queen's attention.
Despite not finding a singular, definitive answer to his problems, King Jaehaerys' 2-year long expedition among the Daughters of Valyria had greatly enhanced his understanding of blood magic, demonstrated when he successfully repaired the damaged sections of the Rosby Road when he returned to Westeros in early 149. However, his extended stay in Lys had embroiled him in Lysene politics, forcing him to leave Westeros again to return a favor to the Rogare family - they helped the king find a tome previously believed lost through their contacts in Mantarys, and in return the king seized a ship holding a member of the family hostage, resolving the situation via rescue. The Rogare family considered this repayment too much for a book, and decided they were now in the king's debt, paving the way for further cooperation between the Red Keep and the banking family.
Porceps and Pandidote
The maesters' plot still fresh in the Red Keep's collective memory, King Jaehaerys declared in the year 150 his intent to assess damage done to the Citadel's buildings ten years prior, when his brother King Aegon had burned Oldtown. The Citadel wrote a polite reply to the king, expressing gratitude for his care but insisted there was no need for such an assessment. Their strategy of denial made sense in light of the following events, which also showed however the king was coming for his assessment whether the Citadel agreed or refused. As the young Lord Orys Velaryon was too young for command, his uncle Vaemond Velaryon commanded the royal fleet, while the king flew with Princess Baela ahead of the fleet to scout for storms, as the royal host set course for Oldtown. Once the royal army disembarked on the banks of the Honeywine, they made their way straight past the sphinxes, with the king at their head, taking little heed of the burned outer walls of the Citadel. The Dragonkeepers seized the maesters that did experiments upon the dragons and the contents of their personal offices, while the king and his army of clerks combed through the vast library of the Citadel, taking all tomes, tracts and treatises touching upon Valyrian magic. Only the few maesters that were known members of the plot escaped, because they were not at Oldtown when the king struck.
Ordering his great harvest to be loaded upon the royal fleet, the king gutted most knowledge the Citadel had acquired regarding Valyria with one swift blow, an act that some believe was his long-overdue vengeance for the maesters' plot. Still, had vengeance been the king's primary motivation behind the Bleeding of the Citadel, it was a curious coincidence indeed he was also building a long road connecting, in sequence, Rosby, Crab Castle, Duskendale, the Antlers and Maidenpool just before he set forth. The king's motivations had been lost to history, but his agents, led by a Myrish eunuch named Kardush, meticulously extracted information from the arrested maesters, including the interpretation of the shorthand they used in their research notes, experiments that were performed upon the dragons, possible long-term effects and ways to cure these effects. Cruelty and torture were minimally employed: King Jaehaerys repeatedly made it clear he wanted to heal the harm the maesters did to the dragons, not extract forced confessions that may cause even more harm. This attitude even prompted the Conclave to offer nominees to the vacant post of Grand Maester, an offer the king claimed he would consider then deadlocked in the royal bureaucracy.
King Jaehaerys later added insult to injury by promising to send construction teams to "repair the shaken foundations of the Citadel". The letter was an utter lie: the king's policies made it clear he fully intended to dig out the very foundations of the Citadel and pull out the entire network of maesters by its roots. It was not a feat that could be accomplished by force alone: to destroy the maesters, Jaehaerys needed to provide an alternative to the myriad services the men in grey offer. A literate staff was one field the royal court could compete with the Citadel: since Grand Maester Munkun's resignation, the duties of the Grand Maester had been taken up by various eunuchs. But the maesters held the secret to training ravens and provided most of the medical services throughout Westeros.
A prickly issue in hand, King Jaehaerys' hate against the men in grey rose to new heights when his sister-paramour Baela Targaryen died in childbirth in 150AC. Maester Oswe claimed the princess' death was an unfortunate accident, but excessive amounts of turmeric were found in the herbal mix she took just before she went into labor, which for the king was good enough evidence Oswe murdered his half-sister by inducing her to bleed to death. After burning the maester and all his apprentices along with Princess Baela's body, Jaehaerys flew to the Isle of Faces to consult the Green Men. It was there he learned from the Green Men the art of creating the tool known as "Porceps", a pincer with a specific design that could help women in difficult labor deliver children, providing an alternative to women like King Jaehaerys' grandmother Queen Aemma, wife of King Viserys. With a pair of weirwood porceps in hand, the king then flew to Driftmark, and sent Vaemond on another mission: to search for the herb the Green Men called the "Pandidote", in the fabled lands of Yi Ti. No Velaryon had been to the distant empire since the Sea Snake, but Vaemond was eager to follow in the steps of the family legend and sailed off to the east with his fleet in 151, escorted by Kardan and Tessarion.
While the Velaryon sailed east, King Jaehaerys returned to King's Landing for the first time in many years. From among his court eunuchs, the Alchemists, and landless highborn sons, Jaehaerys hand-picked a select few with the talent, the mystic bent and the receptiveness to Green Men lore. With these younglings, the king sowed the seeds of a new organization that could provide medical care across all of Westeros as he taught them the many arts of healing he learned from at the Isle of Faces; Prūbrepȳdes led work to construct a building disguised as a roofed garden to house these healers, the result of a different training system from the maesters.
Vaemond discovered that the Pandidote was a fairly common plant in Yi Ti, and successfully returned to King's Landing with boatloads of dried leaves and fresh shoots in 154. With the final ingredients in place, the king taught his students the final recipe in his arsenal: the Elixir of Pandidote Leaf. The 10 men who managed to learn everything up to this point became the first Apothecaries, the second great weapon the Targaryens forged to consolidate their power over the Seven Kingdoms. A feud started between the Consortium of Apothecaries and the Citadel almost as soon as the former came into existence, for they learned while they were still studying under the King, many aspiring Apothecaries were murdered by maesters via poison, for the maesters soon realized what the king was actually trying to do underneath the disguise of gathering "friends of the garden" and did their best to stop it dead in its tracks - they would have succeeded, had the royal eunuchs not won this "shadow war". In memory of their fallen comrades, the Consortium also adopted the practice of wearing silver chain links, to remind themselves of the war that had begun even before they were aware. The surviving Apothecaries honored their fallen companions by learning much about the poisons the maesters use from their corpses.
"The Porceps and Pandidote" became the byname of the Consortium of Apothecaries, due to their most famous cases usually involving difficult pregnancies and poisoning. Among these was the poisoning of Lady Jessamyn Darklyn, then the King's paramour. The lady was fond of riding, and thus fell to the dark machinations of people who wished to assassinate the king in late 154 when she put on a pair of poisoned riding gloves, which given their size and golden dragon decorations, was not made for the dainty Darklyn lady. She soon became bedridden with the fast-acting poison intended for the king, but the plan apparently was for a maester to finish the job, because the poisonous plant juice used was not usually fatal. Nursed by the Apothecaries instead of maesters, Lady Jessamyn endured the poison-induced fever and managed to return to health. The case was especially famous both for this being one of the first cases the Apothecaries handled, and that Lady Jessamyn was pregnant at the time. She would later give birth to a healthy baby fathered by the king in 155.
After ordering the Apothecaries to keep his queen, paramours, and children safe while training more of their number, the King flew to the riverlands, where he began construction of blood temples and replacing the Gold Road with fused stone. Both were built as they supplemented the other: King Jaehaerys could only repair cracked fused stone at blood temples and bringing them all the way back to King's Landing was quite a waste of time. Work first started on the Gold Road because there were fewer lords and castles in the south of the riverlands: in a letter to his queen, the king expressed concern that he was not sure if the riverlords could stomach the bloody extension process of the dragonroad right before their eyes without rebelling should he first replace the River Road; and because the king intended to investigate the rumors of a dragon sighting near Hornvale.
Unrest still brewed in the riverlands, for the permeation of Free City migrants did not reach the region, and the more conservative smallfolk population looked upon the King's work with disdain and disgust. King Jaehaerys did not retaliate - despite attacks against blood temples, no one attacked his roads, and he was content with the belief the roads would prove their worth in the future. However, the violence got so bad construction ground to a halt, and the king occasionally flew off to lords in the Reach who were also close by the Gold Road, such as House Footly of Tumbleton, to check that the violence did not spill over into the lands under the watch of House Tyrell. It was also in this period when official contact resumed between King Jaehaerys and his goodsister Lady Aliandra Martell, who had started styling herself Princess of Dorne following Jaehaerys' election. Though she did not renounce her son's claim to the Iron Throne, as a sign of goodwill, Aliandra called herself "Lady" in her letters to the throne, and in return the king sent maritime maps stretching to the Summer Isles to help Dornish trade ships find their way.
If the king had plans to integrate Dorne deeper into his regime, they were soon shelved to keep his far more important task of roadbuilding up and running. King Jaehaerys' full attention was turned to managing the Redfish Schism.
AN: I am sorry for not realizing the story spun out of control before literally the last day of the month. After we finish the next 11 years of Jaehaerys II's reign in Part 2, we will soon be arriving at a couple of cleanup chapters to outline changes at court and King's Landing, the other highborn Houses, the dragons, and some economic and social trends that interact with the reigns of VOTL's monarchs. If there is some contemporary canon (110s-160s AC) character or House whose changed fate ITTL that you wish to know more about, feel free to comment or PM me and I will check to see if I am could address it.
BEFORE YOU ASK, HOWEVER, CHECK THE FOLLOWING LIST OF HOUSES, ALL OF WHICH ARE SCHEDULED FOR AN OVERVIEW
"The Big Eight" - The Royal House and the Houses of the Lords Paramount:
Targaryen; Stark of Winterfell; Arryn of the Eyrie; Lannister of Casterley Rock; Tully of Riverrun; Baratheon of Storm's End; Tyrell of Highgarden; Nymeros-Martell of Dorne
(If you're wondering where the Greyjoys went, go check Rhaenyra's chapter)
Non-Lord Paramount Houses that are already scheduled to be addressed:
Bolton; Manderley; Florent; Hightower; Fossoway; Frey; Bracken; Blackwood; Tarth; Celtigar (both branches); Velaryon
Uzushiro:
I can't read Spanish (I think your comment is in Spanish, but correct me if I'm wrong), so I asked ChatGPT what you were trying to say, and its reply was "However, if there were a repetition of Baelor the Blessed burning all Valyrian things, I would get angry." I don't recall this happening in canon, but I hope this chapter could assuage this worry at least. There would be no burning of all Valyrian things in quite some time I'm afraid.
Darkbaron36:
Thank you! While I don't consider having sex with your father to stay in power, having a family that wars with itself, giving birth to a dead child and presumably getting killed by a dragon a life "without any tragedy", I would assume I am the author of one the very few stories where Rhaenyra takes the throne so easily i.e. without contesting against the sons of her father, and actually had a realm to rule instead of just idling the days away. I would try to diverge my story further from canon by putting more effort into worldbuilding.