Chapter 21: Victarion
"The king is dead!" his brother's drowned men intoned.
"Balon is dead," Aeron Damphair continued, his hair wet and claggy with seawater. "Balon my brother, who honoured the Old Way and paid the Iron Price! Balon the Brave, Balon the Blessed, Balon Twice-Crowned, who won us back our freedoms and our god. Balon is dead... but an iron king will rise again, to rule the isles. For what is dead may never die!"
"What is dead may never die!" the drowned men again intoned, their voices discordant and clanging in his ears, but still fervent and eager. "A king shall rise! A king shall rise!"
The crashing of the waves answered their chants. Victarion watched as the drowned men quieted, watching the waves roll and crash and lap at the rocks below. All around him, the crowd seemed to jostle and stir, each man looking to their neighbours to see which one of them might presume to chance a claim on the Seastone Chair.
Victarion watched from the corner of his eye as Euron stood silent with his arms crossed, flanked by his mutes and monkeys and monsters. Go on, Victarion silently urged. But Euron did not speak, no doubt in the knowledge that as these captains had all come this long way to this feast and would not choose the first dish set before them. Go on, Victarion again thought, his gaze acerbic, claim the throne like you claimed my wife. She won't come so easy to you this time.
But only the winds and waves answered Aeron's call, and Euron stayed silent. "The Ironborn must have a king," Aeron declared. "So I ask again: Who shall be king?"
"Me!" a deep voice boomed, and the crowd parted. He was a great old ruin of a man, ninety-years old and fat. He wore a cloak of white bearskin, like the last few strands of hair on his head and the great shaggy beard that fell down to his knees. He sat in a driftwood throne, carried up the hill by his grandsons, all of whom were made red-faced by the effort.
Forty years ago he might have been a threat, Victarion thought, but his best days are all long past.
"Why not!" he boomed at the looks he got from the crowd. "Who better? I'm Erik Ironmaker, Erik the Just, Erik Anvil-Breaker." He looked down to his grandsons below. "Show them my hammer, Thormor," he commanded. One of them hefted it up with a heave, holding it aloft for the crowd to see. It was a monstrous thing, with a spiked brick of steel for a head. "I've smashed more heads with tha' thing than I can remember," he said, "but maybe some widows could tell you. Now, I could tell you all the deeds I've done in all the battles I won, but I won' live long enough to finish. So if old is wise, then there's none wiser than me. If big is strong, there's none bigger. And I got heirs - more'n I can count. So, come say it with me. KING ERIK! KING ERIK ANVIL-BREAKER!"
Below his seat, his grandsons took up the cry, beating their chests. The crowd joined the chant even as his grandsons set down the driftwood seat and raised axes and swords in the air, chanting over and over. The rest of the crowd looked caught in the chant, but before they could build any true rallying-cry a woman's voice cut loudly through the din.
"ERIK!" Asha cried. The crowd parted to let her through as she approached the driftwood throne. "Stand up, Erik!"
A hush fell over the crowd. Off in the corner, Victarion saw Euron's face split into a grin. The crowd broke out murmuring and muttering.
"What did you say, girl?" Erik asked, his voiced deep and dangerous.
"Stand up," Asha said, unperturbed by Erik's grandsons glowering at her. "Stand up and I'll cry your name with all the rest. You want a crown? Then stand up and take it."
Euron's smile spread, and then a laugh bubbled up his throat and past his lips. Erik shot him a glare, and Euron just laughed louder. Erik's arms gripped the sides of his throne tight, his fingers white. He heaved and groaned. His face went purple with strain, and though for a second it seemed as though he might do it, his breath escaped him at his last second, his strength escaping with it. He leaned back, bowed his head and finally looked his age, and his grandsons hefted up his throne, and carried him sullenly down the hill.
"Who shall rule the Ironborn?" Aeron asked again once Erik was gone. Again, the people in the crowd looked at one another. Some glanced at Euron, others at him, and a final few glanced at Asha. Victarion counted. Him and Euron were roughly even, and Asha was far behind.
"Make your claim," the Merlyn called to him, "so we can have this mummer's farce done with."
Victarion shook his head. The crowd wasn't quite done with it's revelry yet. "When I am ready," he shouted back, "and no sooner."
Another two claimants presented themselves: Gylbert Farwynd, who offered the crowd a fool's fantasy of a great land in the west for the Ironborn to claim; and then Old Drumm, who spoke and spoke till he lost the chants and cheers he'd won himself, and then offered such petty gifts that his last supporters left him. Each time the crowd grew excited, and then fell disappointed when the men proved unsuitable.
It's time, Victarion knew. Aeron was shooting him a tight look, even as he asked again, "Who shall rule the Ironborn? Who shall be king over us?" Victarion nodded to Aeron for his introduction. "Nine sons sprung from the loins of Lord Quellon Greyjoy. But one was mightier than the rest, and knows no fear."
The captains all parted before him as Victarion shook himself and began his climb to the top of the hill. "Bless me, brother," he said when he reached the top. He knelt and bowed his head before the glory of the Drowned God, watching his waves. Aeron pulled his waterskin from the folds of his robes and poured the salty brine of seawater atop his head.
"What is dead may never die," Aeron intoned, "but rises again, harder and stronger."
When Victarion stood, his champions all arrayed themselves before him. One man unfurled the Greyjoy banner. "You all know me," Victarion began, eye flicking to Euron to watch for any disruptions. "If you want sweet words, go elsewhere. If you want heads smashed, you're in the right place. I have no great tongue, but I have this here axe. With it, I was a loyal brother," Victarion said. "The first time Balon took a crown, he sent me to Lannisport to singe the Lion's tail. I led his longships, and never lost but one. The second time, it was me he sent to see to the Young Wolf if he came howling home. And that's all I have to say."
Besides him, his champions began the chant. "VICTARION! VICTARION! KING VICTARION!" They flung open the chests, stuffed to the gills with gold and silver and gemstones, quite literally a king's ransom. The captains in the crowd scrambled to seize as much as they could, taking up the chant as they did so. "VICTARION! VICTARION! KING VICTARION!"
Victarion watched Euron closely as the crowd kicked up in a frenzy. He stood, relaxed and quiet. Does he mean to stay silent? Victarion wandered. Has one of his mongrels finally ripped out his tongue? Victarion braced himself for an interruption, but when the voice ripped through the chants and cut through the crowd, it wasn't Euron.
"Nuncle!," Asha cried. "Nuncle! It was good of you to bring gifts to my queensmoot, Nuncle, but you need not have worn so much armour. I promise I won't hurt you." She turned to face the captains, and Victarion felt the urge to punch the back of her head as some of the captains laughed. "There's nobody braver than my nuncle," she said, "nobody stronger, nobody fiercer in a fight. He has no sons, though. His wives keep dying. The Crow's Eye is his elder and has a better claim..."
What are you doing? Victarion raged in his mind. You came to me! Offered to be my hand, all so that Euron wouldn't win! And now you hold him above me!
"He does!" one man cried from the crowd below.
"Ah," Asha said, "but my claim is better still. Balon's brother cannot come before Balon's son!"
"Balon's sons are dead!" one of his champions shouted over the wind. "All I see is Balon's little daughter!"
"Aye," she said, "I'm his daughter. And I'm a a mother too." She pulled a dirk from under her jerkin, tucked between her breasts. "Here's my suckling babe!" She held it up for the crowd. "I may be a woman, but I'm man enough for this! Nuncle says he'll give you more of what my father gave you. And what was that? Gold and glory, some of you will say. Freedom, others will no doubt agree. But most of all, he gave us defeat. Tell me, how many of you have had your homes put to the torch when Robert came? How many wives and daughters and sisters of yours were raped and despoiled? No, what my father really gave you was burnt towns and broken castles. Nuncle promises more of the same. But not me."
"And what will you give us?" another man asked as Victarion seethed. "Knitting?"
"We need to take a lesson from the Young Wolf," she said, ignoring the man, "who won every battle, and lost all. We need to take a lesson from the Boy King on the Iron Throne, who lost every battle, and won all."
"A wolf is not a kraken," Victarion felt the need to break in. "What the kraken grasps it does not lose, be it longship or leviathan."
"And what have we grasped, Nuncle?" Asha asked. "The north? We have Winterfell, aye, and Moat Cailin and Deepwood Motte and Torrhen's Square, but that is all leagues and leagues away. What do we really have to show for it?" She waved, and the men of the Black Wind pushed forwards, heavy oaken chests on their shoulders that they set down before Asha. "I give you the wealth of Stony Shore," Asha said as she flipped open one chest, "I give you the riches of Deepwood, the wealth of Moat Cailin, and lastly, the gold of Winterfell. Your sons and brothers all died for this. And if you'd keep trading their lives for turnips, then by all means, keep shouting my nuncle's name!"
"And what would you offer us?" the crowd seemed to ask with one man.
"Peace," Asha said, reaching again under her jerkin and withdrawing a little bundle of paper from between her breasts. "Land. Victory. I'll give you the Stepstones and the Disputed Lands and the Orange Shore and Volantis and Myr and Pentos and Norvos. Enough stones for every man to build his own keep, and enough land to shame even King Harwyn Hardhand and Harren the Black!"
"Land even further away than the north," Victarion noted.
"Which is where this comes in," she said, brandishing the paper like a blade. "For on this page is an offer of peace from the Iron Throne! Peace, independence, and the return of the Old Way! Support for our new endeavours, not on the shores of Westeros, but in Essos! Where we can raid and reave and rape and pillage to our heart's content without ever having to worry about the Iron Throne!"
Victarion scoffed. "I'm not afraid of a little boy," he said. "I'll show the Boy King where he can put his peace!"
"Nor am I," Asha said. "But we all know what happened when Robert brought the full might of his muster against us. And it isn't the Boy King I worry about, it's his grandfather. What will the Old Lion do, I wonder, if we fight him and we lose?"
That stilled the crowd a little, and Victarion felt himself scowling. He searched his mind for the answer, and came up empty. Even here, Tywin Lannister was feared and respected. He showed no mercy. And the Boy King was yet so young. He wouldn't have had the wherewithal to send such an offer. No, that letter had to be from the Old Lion's own hand. And what then? The south was just so much bigger than the north. Another war would inevitably mean another loss.
"Your choice is simple!" Asha continued. "Crown me, for victory and peace and endless plunder. Or crown my uncle, for more war and more defeat. What will you have, Ironmen?"
"VICTORY!" shouted Rodrick Harlaw, his hands cupped over his mouth. "ASHA! ASHA! QUEEN ASHA!" Others in the crowd joined his chant, stamping their feet and shaking their fists. Victarion couldn't believe his eyes. They were all shouting for her... for a woman!
If only she had showed him that letter earlier, he would have taken her as his hand! If she had offered more than just false help and promises, I would have accepted. The Iron Throne offers us our independence, and you keep it from me? Victarion almost struggled to believe it. If only she had told me the truth.
But she hadn't, and now some looked to be refusing to join her chant. "NO CRAVEN'S PEACE!" one of his champions shouted over the crowd. The chants of "VICTARION! VICTARION! KING VICTARION!" continued where they had left off. A fight looked to be brewing as the two sides shouted ever louder over one another, building to a confrontation. One man threw something at Asha's head, and she had to duck out the way. Victarion made no move to calm the crowd. Asha had asked for this when she'd lied.
But then, sharp as a knife, a shrill horn cut through the clamour. It was one of Euron's mongrels with his mouth to the horn. It blew again, terrible and rattling with a high wailing shriek that threatened to make Victarion's ears bleed. If he doesn't stop soon, Victarion thought, I'll go up there and smash his head in with that horn, kingsmoot or not.
It took a few moments longer, but eventually the shrill wail of the horn fell silent.
"Ironmen!" said Euron, climbing up the hill to join him and Asha. "Your have heard my horn. Now hear me. I am Quellon's son, and Balon's oldest living brother. The blood of the kraken flows through my veins, and my heart beats with the waves of the sea. I have sailed further afield than any man here. Only one living kraken here has never known defeat. Only one living kraken here had never bent the knee. Only one has sailed as far as the Shadow of Asshai, and gazed at wonders and terrors beyond imagining."
"If you like the shadows so much," Asha foolishly interrupted, "you should go join them."
"My little brother would continue Balon's war," Euron pressed on, ignoring Asha, "and try and claim the north. My sweet, foolish niece would give us peace with a blade to our necks. Asha prefers a false victory to a true defeat. Victarion wants a kingdom, but will take a few clods of earth. With me, you shall have more! I offer a true victory and a true kingdom!
"We are the Ironborn, and we are conquerors! My brother would have you content with the cold north, my niece with a fantasy as mad as the land beyond the Sunset Sea! But I will give you Lannisport, Highgarden, Oldtown, the Arbor. We will take the Riverlands, the Reach, the Westerlands, the North, the Vale, the Stormlands, the Crowlands and Dorne! Together, we will take all of Westeros! For the glory of the Drowned God!"
"Crow's Eye," Asha called with admonishment in her tone, "did you leave your wits in Asshai? How can we hold the Seven Kingdoms if we cannot even hold the north?"
"It has been done before," Euron said. "Did Balon never teach his darling daughter the ways of war? Did he never teach you about Aegon the Conquerer?"
"Aegon?" Victarion asked. "Aegon had dragons."
"Yes," Asha nodded, "and I see no dragons here."
Euron grinned. "That horn you heard was from the ruins of Valyria, niece, where no other man dared go. Your heard it's call, felt it's power. It is a dragon horn, made from bands of red gold and Valyrian steel engraved with enchantments. The dragonlords of Valyria sounded such horns before the Doom. With this horn, Ironmen, I can bind dragons to my will."
Asha laughed. "But there are no more dragons," she said. "A horn to bind goats would be of more use."
Euron's smiling eye glinted in the moonlight. Victarion felt a pit of dread open in the bottom of his gut as he saw that eye.
"Again, girl," he said, "you are wrong. There are three dragons, and I know just where to find them."
Feel free to comment and let me know what you think.
Hope you guys enjoy!
P.S. May be subject to a rewrite or edits in the future
P.P.S. This chapter is ahead of schedule. The next one will likely be delayed.