(Pyke: 3/6/299) Ivory II
Her vision and surroundings were dark, but slowly forms began to take shape out of the blackness, followed by a familiar voice. One she knew to be the Crow's Eye himself, a man who was half-beast, and who had been shadowed by an endless tide of death ever since she had first met him. He had arrived upon the deck of 'the Silence' in dramatic fashion, launching up from the depths of the sea like a serpent, clutching at a dragon egg, clad in nothing but a black shimmering carapace, and rows upon rows of shark-like teeth. His skin had been beyond pale, and nearly transparent. Two thin slits marked where his nose should be, while at the sides of his neck were four large gashes that opened and closed like the gills of a fish. Embedded within the shadowy carapace of his monstrous chest had been a black stone that mirrored the night sky. An object she had note as being similar to the stone she had seen many months before and had since lost account of. Ivory saw the man-beast in the black fog, speaking to another, this one Yi-Tish in look and clad in yellow robes studded with gold and bits of brass. Around the man's neck hung a great amulet, within which was yet another black stone that swirled in similar fashion to the one before.
"You have done well, Greyjoy. Though your methods are somewhat lacking in their precision," the robed man said contemptuously.
"No thanks to your advice, you sniveling cunt of a wizard!" the monster hissed, his black armor rippling like a second skin. "Not only has it cost me my niece, who has escaped to gods-know-where, but has also resulted in the loss of two dragon eggs!"
A part of her had been horrified at his terribly gruesome visage, when she had first laid eyes upon him, while the other had strangely been relieved. For she had known many a monster who would take the guise of mortal men and women, before they would besiege her with their own peculiar tastes and tortuous penchants for luring her into false senses of security before betraying her. However, with the Crow's Eye, he had held no such disguise, nor made bid to do so, even though he claimed to be capable of such. She knew the man was a monster inside and out, which conjured up the oddest bit of comfort within her.
"Your niece is no longer of any concern. Especially now that you have completed the pit," the man said in a velvet tone, undistracted by the kraken's venom.
At the words, Ivory's mind flashed to the shallow pit filled with black ichor, and writing eel-like things. Things which waited eagerly for the next unfortunate victim that they would rip from their natural moorings and replace with something far more hideous. Creatures, similar in form to the Crow's Eye, but decidedly lesser in stature, and from what she could tell, near completely mindless. The disloyal had been cast into the pit or torn to shreds. While the others had bent the knee to the monster who controlled the seas with an iron fist.
"And what of my nephew?" the Euron bared his teeth, and in the darkness she saw his carapace undulate in irritation. "The firebitch will learn of what has transpired here, and she will move against us soon enough!"
"Be calm, Greyjoy, her days are numbered."
"Be calm!?" the monster bellowed, his shoulders bristling in anger. "That woman's machinations have already seen me slain twice! I do not intend to give her a third chance."
"My, my, I did not take you for some insolent child who bleats at every unforeseen hindrance placed in its path," an unforgiving grin curled up the Yi-Tish man's face.
"You're one to talk, Shin-Ga. You only worry about the woman from afar, sitting in that hovel you call a fortress, twiddling your thumbs!" the man barked, displaying his serrated teeth like some mongrel dog. "While I have to deal with her here!"
"I have my own mission, pirate," a grim countenance overtook the man-in-yellow's formerly aloof expression. "One that deals with a hundred kings, a thousand princes, and a stubborn earth queen with her water witch!"
"The queen and the witch? Was that not Qano's…" the brute pressed before the man-in-yellow had cut him off.
"That fool has met his end!" the sorcerer sneered.
"What!? How?! Why was he not returned?" the kraken questioned in apparent surprise.
"Because he utterly failed at the simple task set before him, and now I must see to it that it is finished, lest I suffer the same fate! So do not whine to me, about one officious fire princess! Azula will be in the dirt soon enough, and the way made clear to eliminate the spirits that have come to call Dragonstone home. The Other failed with the spirit of light, where we cannot with the dark. That creature is dangerously close to uncovering the nature of the design, and we cannot allow it to infect the nascent world with its malignant presence," the sorcerer raised his chin as black fog swirled about, hindering her gaze for but a moment. "As for young Theon? Send word to him, and continue as planned."
"You refer to the red witch's visions and blood magic? Bah!" the beast waved off the yellow-robed man's seemingly empty assurances. "The only thing they have delivered thus far is the death of my brother, who died of stomach pains. The Baratheon whore is not so weak as to die from something so dull, and I see nothing on the horizon for her that hints at some imminent demise. She holds all advantage. And what of the eggs, Shin-Ga? Hmm?"
"Their absence is a minor problem, and one that will rectify itself in due time," the Yi-Tishman reassured. "The cheesemonger did not survive so long by being foolish enough to place things of such incredible value all upon one ship, Greyjoy. You should have foreseen such a ploy when you made move against him. I would have thought you'd have learned your lesson when you attempted the same with the Other?"
The beast, Euron, sniffed and held to his silence.
"Well," Shin-Ga clapped, "irrespective of your short-sightedness, we know where the other two will eventually emerge." The man-in-yellow turned a questioning eye towards the fiend. "Which brings me to the boy. Has he made landfall yet?"
"He has," Euron nodded sharply, arms crossed over his chest. "My eyes, beneath the Sea of Dorne, have seen their ships passing through, accompanied by Dornish sails. I believe their intent is to consolidate their forces at Yronwood, and begin their march to Summerhall, in an effort to flank the stag while he marches with the roses to the Westerlands. Those flowers and snakes, they reek of treachery," the man-beast laughed in a strained but unenthusiastic hiss.
"Excellent, then we merely need to wait," the man's robes shifted as he reached for the amulet at his neck and closed his eyes.
"The fat king, Shin-Ga," Euron lowered his head in a low growl.
"What about him?" the man opened his eyes.
"It should not have gotten this far. He should have been dead by now. The realms should have been in far more disarray," the Crow's eye said, as his bottomless black orbs glistened beneath an unseen light within the dark fog. "Of all the Red Witch's failed prophecies, this has been the most disappointing. 'Murdered by a pig,' indeed. That ought to have occurred months ago, sorcerer!" Greyjoy clenched his clawed hand, before pointing to the man. "Let me rend the woman's flesh from her bones, so we can get to the truth of the matter, and then be done with her and her elusive fire god! She's useless! If we had done things my way from the start, Westeros would ha…!"
"No!" the Yi-Tish man roared, slapping away the malformed hand and revealing naught but smoke. "Our trust in her must be without question," the man calmed himself and rubbed at his chin. "At least until the dragons come forth," he added, as his glittering golden eyes stared at the empty black orbs of his counterpart. "An endeavor, which I am told, that only she and the Targaryen girl can accomplish whilst the red star burns in the sky."
"'Whilst the red star burns?'" Euron snarled back, in a badly mimicked form of the Yi-Tishman's own words. "The damned thing has been burning for more than a week, and the dragons have yet to 'come forth!' Thus far, the only thing that has come forth, has been the colossal boon it has afforded the firebitch and her people! We only barely managed to take the fucking fort on this accursed island," the man-beast sliced at the air with his misshapen hand. "Had there been only a handful more," Greyjoy clenched his fist and reiterated, "Just a handful, then they would have had strength enough to throw my army back into the sea! These plans of yours are bereft of reason, Shin-Ga! Consider yourself fortunate that I managed to end the spiritwalker before she could send word to Dragonstone!"
Ivory drew in a sharp breath, at the words, her mind returning her to the stormy night that had seen her standing atop the deck of 'the Silence' where she had borne witness to the fall of Azula's Mercy. Her eyes had been fixed upon the defenders as they fought valiantly against the tide of flesh and teeth that had come from below. The Demoness' warriors had stood their ground, had carefully positioned themselves atop the battlements as any good defender is wont to do, before unleashing great walls of fire, and blasts of flame. Long did they last before the rains began falling harder and heavier, obscuring all vision, save miraculously her own. Bolts of lightning lit the world bright as day. In the furious tempest, their arcane light revealed the slick forms of the ones from the deep as they swarmed up and over the walls like a flood. She remembered hearing the hurried shouts and frenzied screams drifting along the howling wind and pouring rain. The flames grew smaller and less numerous, and before long the fort had been overwhelmed, its garrison completely consumed.
"They are not my plans, Crow's Eye," the robed man shot back with narrowed, gleaming, eyes. "You know from where they come? From whom they come?"
The man who was her host, outside of the strange place she found herself in, had turned deathly silent and stared daggers at the man-in-yellow.
"I take your silence as a form of understanding?" the man's ringed hands clasped together beneath golden robes as he glared, watching as the Greyjoy made no move of defiance. "Good! Because make no mistake, pirate, your unsightly little carcass can very easily be sent back down into the depths from whence it was summoned, as Qano's was. We do not question the design, Greyjoy, we are merely the tools that see it done! So take heed, and do not press this issue, or you will suffer a fate far worse than death!"
"As you say…" the kraken muttered, before squaring his shoulders and staring at the man once more. "Still, if things proceed as they are, then it won't be long until the King's allies smash the lions and the false dragon, before securing the whole damned realm. Stannis' whelp is already far stronger, and has achieved far more, than we had anticipated! What other surprises await us, I wonder?! She's already destroyed Sarsfield, and the waves have spoken to me of Banefort and Westerling sending ravens to her. Even with the Kingslayer and the lion's brother pillaging the Riverlands, the lands of the old lion are still turning against him, and she is practically at his door by now. If she kicks them down, then what am I to do?! Imbued as I am, even I would be hard-pressed to conjure up a victory against her, assuming the reports are true, let alone the combined forces of the Seven-Kingdoms under the leadership of Robert-fucking-Baratheon! We wasted those damned leeches on fucking Stannis, of all people, and my brother, when we should have saved them for the King and that bloody runt! I could have killed Balon on my own, and Stannis is as worthless a target as they come."
"Yet you did not, and now you are negotiating with the old lion, I wager?" the man's golden robes sparkled in the blackness.
"I will not ask how it is that you know, but the Lannisters are the only option available to me now," Euron had snorted, before crossing his arms and causing a surreal ripple to reverberate all along the black carapace. "But they are a temporary need. I only require them to divert attentions away from my army, so that I may seize the substance the young fawn has sent for from Dragonstone. Then once the northern fleet is dealt with, we can break the wall, and leave the Others and Westeros to tear at each other's throats. Does that sound good enough for you, Shin-Ga?"
"Of course," the sorcerer nodded. "The goal was always to disrupt the kingdoms. Always to end the woman before she fixed her gaze upon the east, and disrupted my efforts here."
"Your attempt after the rebellion certainly did not give me such an impression," Euron cackled.
"She was never the target, Greyjoy. It would have been far too costly to utilize them on her directly. No, the faceless man served his purpose just fine. It led us to you, did it not?" the golden man smirked. "Which makes me wonder, if you could have initiated such a plan, had you done things your way from the beginning?" he probed, ignoring the Greyjoy's sharp tongue.
"…Perhaps…." even from her obscured view, Ivory could tell Euron's reply had been bereft of conviction.
"The answer is no, then. Remember that things happen as they must, pirate. Never question the design," the Yi-Tish sorcerer had said, before he glanced towards her hidden position with a serene smile upon his face. "Never."
Her eyes shot open at the sound of thunder, as it echoed and rumbled throughout the tower in an earsplitting boom. From her sparsely furnished chamber, within the castle of Pyke, Ivory lay uncomfortably upon her simple straw and feather bed, after returning to life from another sleepless night. Through the walls, she could hear the waves as they crashed violently upon the rocks below. The already unnerving cacophony, brought about by the ever present storm that lingered over the island, had tested the last of her patience. "Quiet!" she screamed, covering her ears. "By all the gods, old and new, be quiet!" Hearing thunder crash once more, she blew a raspberry, before throwing her face into her uncomfortably scratchy pillow, and screaming. "Damn you Euron!" her muffled voice filtered unevenly through the pillow. "Why couldn't you bring a calm cool breeze instead of a fucking storm!?" Ivory screeched, fully convinced that the tumultuous nature of her environs were as they were so as to not allow for even the briefest of respite from the visions plagued her. The smell of salt hung in the air, a pleasant smell to some, but an odor of the foulest order to her. Ivory opened her eyes, ready to gag, until she found herself staring at a layer of grime staining the surface of the cushion inches away from her face. She sneered at it, and threw the pillow across the room, damning the thing and the memories it had conjured of her former 'home.'
Intermingling with the waves, she could hear a series of dreadful screams as they echoed out from deep within the castle fortress. A horribly recurring feature of her new home, and one that she knew very well the origin of. 'Victims of the Pit…' Ivory shivered at the thought. Many terrifying things had she seen, during her captivity, that this was merely just another curiosity to add to her far too well-traveled mind. One that she saw opportunity in, no matter how much it had disgusted her. Attempting to tune out as much of the ambient noise as she could, Ivory turned on her side, focusing vibrant amethysts upon the ugly wooden door leading to the outside hall.
Life could have been worse, she knew, but now, even as she dwelled within the castle of shit-stained rocks, here she was treated as royalty. A part of her would always have a sense of doubt about the things around her, but even the pit, and the leeches, and the fire, had been nothing but odd things of note. Things that paled in comparison to that which had come before, and the tiniest part of her was grateful for it. The Red Woman had defended her, of course, as had her disciples, but deep within the featureless black orbs the monster had for eyes, she could tell Greyjoy truly did not care, and truth be told, neither did she. 'I will never again be at the mercy of others,' she assured herself, gripping at the dagger beneath her sheets. 'Someone, or something, holds your leash, Greyjoy,' Ivory idled within herself, her ears on the alert for even the smallest of noises outside of the door. 'Is it the speaker of the voice outside of the ship? The man-in-yellow? Or the 'Emperor' he spoke of? Or something else?' Before anymore of her thoughts could escape her, she heard a polite knock at the door, and knew immediately who stood at the opposite side of it. "What do you want, Melisandre?" she grumbled.
"I have brought you nourishment, Princess," she heard the velvety voice reply from behind the door, prim and proper as you like, even in the near deafening storm brewing just outside the walls.
"Fine, fine," Ivory stood up, and calmly walked up to the wretched wooden door. She unlocked the grisly kraken handle, opening the door only slightly, to stare at the woman with the red hair holding a large platter of red meat and steamed cabbages. "Quite the feast. Has the Crow's Eye and his school of fishes eaten another merchant?" she deadpanned, opening the door even more, to allow the platter to pass through. Taking the plate, she moved to shut the door, only to find the woman had barred her from doing so with her foot.
"A word, if you please, Princess?" the red woman labored, her porcelain face plastered with a smile.
"If you insist," she shrugged, letting the door swing fully open as she moved to a pair of small wooden chairs and haphazardly built table.
"Are you well?" the woman asked, hands hidden beneath blood-red sleeves.
"As well as I can be," Ivory said in a flat tone, as she bore her lilac eyes into the crimson ones of the priestess from Volantis. "Why do you carry on this way? Asking after me like I am some lost pup?"
"Because you are, Princess," Melisandre nodded with a smile, slithering to her side as she sat and wolfed down the meat and cabbages like some starved commoner.
"I have been lost for fifteen years," lightning crashed at her words. "I could have done with your presence back when I had been ripped from my mother's womb. You're far too late to claim protectorship over me now," Ivory said, as she gulped down the proffered food, whilst staring straight into woman's unsettling red eyes. She chewed the red meat loudly, all the while feeling a certain solidity growing about her as she swallowed.
"Was it not only months before that such abundant food had been but a dream to you?" the woman smiled her quaint diminutive smile.
"Do not mock me, Priestess," Ivory snarled, dribbling bits of blood, as she tore at the seared flesh of the poor creature who had been served to her. "I have rarely slept with even a partially full belly, and have had to endure such things for so long without even a whisper of discontent. I know how to endure without food, you witch. If you think plying me with such things will get you into my good graces, you'll need to try harder," she hissed as she ate, looking upon the mirrors by her bedside, and seeing the beginnings of fat forming along certain areas of her body. "For the past few weeks, I may have eaten as if there was to be no tomorrow, but I have only done so because I have no intention of wasting the opportunity. If you seek to deny me such things, in whatever meager efforts your mind can invoke at manipulating me, then rest assured that I will outlast you and Greyjoy just as I did Varg and Laz."
"I meant no offense, Princess," the woman raised her hands in placation, as the winds howled about the outside of the tower. Her crimson eyes shined unnervingly in the torchlight, as they watched her. "I have only made note of the fullness your body has taken," Melisandre said, as she moved to run her fingers through Ivory's full head of long hair.
"Don't touch me!" Ivory recoiled, nearly spitting out her food. "Don't ever touch me!"
"You know I mean you no harm," the woman soothed.
"Says the woman who placed leeches upon me," she snorted, not truly perturbed by act, but more by the familiarity of it, and the recollections it had beckoned to at the back of her mind. 'The voice in the flames. The kraken gurgling black blood. The stork with the golden crown, who was ripped apart by sparrows. The stag with the burning heart and the flaming sword.' "That is the last time I will allow you so close."
The priestess withdrew, placing hands upon her lap. "You are far from the withered form that we found drifting upon the debris of your previous ship. Your body possesses a healthy rosiness about it."
"A polite way of saying I have meat on my bones," she spat.
"Yes," Melisandre smiled, "and it has taken hold, refusing to give way to anything other than starvation. You look every bit the Princess that I have envisioned."
"Somehow I doubt that," she scoffed, taking handfuls of steamed cabbages and stuffing them into her face. "I imagine you will be getting to a point soon?" she added, with full-mouth, causing bits of food to fall from her lips, and onto her bed. Wasting no time, Ivory reached for them, intent on delivering them to their proper place in her belly.
"True, you are not as, shall we say, polished, as I would have wished. But, that can be remedied," the woman produced a small bag from beneath her sleeves, and held it up in her palm. "I would give you this, if you wish it?"
"And what is that?" she eyed the little pouch with suspicion, as she slurped up cabbage and chunks of meat.
"A gift," the priestess said, before moving to untie the thin cord wrapped around the lips of the tiny leathery container. As it fell open, a small golden choker fashioned into the form of a dragon, and encrusted with rubies, was revealed to her. The crimson stones glittered under the torchlight, and for a fleeting moment, she was mesmerized. "Would you care to try it on?"
Looking at it, she faced the woman, "I'd rather sell it to buy my way off of these rocks."
Melisandre blinked, then smiled. "It would fetch a decent price," she said, holding it up. "However, I do not think there exists many sailors upon these rocks, as you say, that would be willing to accept any amount of gold when it comes to ferreting you away from here. Especially when it risks drawing the kraken's wrath."
"I'm sure I could find one lurking about," Ivory shot back, her plate nearly picked clean.
"Are you certain you do not wish to try it on?" red eyes flickered in the light.
"Would it get you out of my room?" Ivory sighed.
The priestess smiled, then dipped her head once in reply.
Without a word, she rubbed her hands over her shirt, and then snatched the gaudy piece of jewelry from the woman's grasp. She stood up, staring at the golden dragon coiled around the numerous rubies, and moved to place it upon her neck. As she did so, she felt a momentary sense of weightlessness overtake her before vanishing. After the odd feeling had passed, she stared with as much awe as she could muster, at what had once been her scarred hands and burned arm. Ivory turned to the woman, who calmly sat at her wooden chair, holding a soft smile. On unsteady legs she ambled on towards the mirror in her room and beheld the woman she had seen during her last night upon 'the Bloody Woman.' The beautiful woman with the long, silvery-white hair. The one with the black dress who had stood like a queen, staring out onto the sea. Her eyes welled as she stared at her reflection, and touched at her face, before an ugly frown marred the perfect image. "No!" she screeched, hesitating but a moment, before tearing at the thing adorning her neck and casting it across the room. "This is not me! That is not me!" she pointed to the mirror. "I will not hide behind some illusion! I am not ashamed of who I am, or what I look like! I have worn your little trinket, witch, now get out of my room!"
Crimson eyes turned downcast, as the woman rose from her seat. Gingerly, the red priestess walked towards the fallen piece of jewelry and recovered it from the filthy stone floor. With the faintest of smiles still lingering upon her heart-shaped face, Melisandre whispered, "Unpolished or no, you will always be beautiful to me, my Queen." She bowed, closing the door behind her, as she exited the room like a phantom
Ivory felt her legs collapse under her, and she sobbed quietly in the echoes of the thundering storm.