Save the Dragons
F.Y.I: I can't cover everything about conquering a city in one chapter, so don't worry if anything is missing but I stopped at 5k+. Please feel free to share ideas on what else Laenor should do next.
Chapter 9 – Archon
Laenor
"Shit!" cursed Laena as he took her dragon, the ivory Cyvasse piece settling in nicely with his pile of conquered pieces.
"You must mind your dragons, they're not invincible, you know," Laenor laughed, taking a swig of Arbor Gold.
"You must mind your dragons..." Laena mocked in a high-pitched voice, which just made Laenor laugh harder.
They sat together in his rooms inside the Archon's Palace, nestled inside the inner Black Walls of the city.
"I still can't believe what you're doing with your hair," she told him.
He was getting it dyed a deep vermilion and was simultaneously being measured for an ornate suit of filigreed armour and a gilded helm shaped like a hippocamp's head, chased with silver. Which he had commissioned the city's famed armourers the moment he'd entered the city. Laenor remembered Brown Ben's advice: "Man wants to be the king o' the rabbits, he best wear a pair o' floppy ears."
But he put much more poetically to his sister, "When in Tyrosh, do as the Tyroshi." And the Tyroshi were flamboyant people who liked pretty colours and shiny things.
"Is that why we're playing this stupid game?" she asked, losing another piece to his elephant.
"Quite, I need to practice if I'm to be any good in the parlours, and Father is too busy sorting out the fleet to play games."
"Whereas I am bored stiff," Laena complained. "Tell me about the battle?"
Laenor hauled back on his wineskin, savouring every drop. He'd been drinking far more ever since the battle had ended.
"It was fucking awful," he told her, "I've never seen such destruction before in my life. I don't think I ever truly understood our 'fire and blood' until that day."
"You always knew what it was going to be like..." she reminded him gently.
"Knowing and seeing are too different things."
Laena hummed in agreement, "It was hard for me too, the first time I rode Vhagar into war."
"Does it get better?" Laenor asked of her.
"Not really, but you learn to live with it."
Laenor sighed, and drank another swallow, then offered his sister a swallow.
"I can't stop thinking about my boys, what it would have been like if they'd seen what I'd done."
"You can't dwell on that," cautioned his sister.
"I know, I know," he agreed, "I wish I was back home with them, fishing in our dory like how Father used to take us."
"I wish I was with my daughters too. Focus on that, you'll be home soon enough, once we're done in this cesspit."
Laenor groaned, his sister was not a fan of Tyrosh, "It's not a cesspit."
"There are slaves in chains outside these very walls."
"Not for long, not when I have my way."
"Then you'd best get started soon."
He let loose another sigh. Tyrosh was in chaos, riots had broken out when he'd taken the city. Now all they could was wait until Joffrey and the levies could pacify it and stop the looting.
Laenor so longed to be back at home with his wife and children, but Tyrosh's pacification needed to be achieved first.
The two of them played for a while more, enjoying the other's company.
"Are you happy, Laena?"
"What makes you ask that?" she queried with a red face.
"I'm your brother, I worry about you."
"I am not discontent if that's what you're asking."
"It's not a riddle, are you happy?"
"I'm happy being here with you," she answered, knocking over his king with her reclaimed dragon in an act of defiance at losing.
"But are you happy with Daemon?"
"There are worse husbands, and he has given me the twins," Laena replied, somewhat coolly.
"But you're not in love with him?"
For some reason, she snorted, "Not all of us are lucky enough to marry for love."
"Yet you chose him."
This time she scoffed, "Please, Laenor, Father chose Daemon, I simply went along with it because it made more sense than marrying anyone else."
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have brought it up."
"Why did you?" she demanded.
Laenor did not truly know. He had noticed over the years that Laena had lost something about her, that her smiles did not reach her eyes as often as they once had, so he presumed that life with Daemon must be harder than she made it out.
"I just want you to be happy..." he said, trying to will her to understand.
She evidently did not as she stole his wineskin and left him there alone.
Laenor should have kept his big mouth shut.
He hoped they would be reconciled soon. Tyrosh was a lonely place without friends.
The Conclave of Tyrosh had gathered in the Bleeding Tower to vote for the next Archon. The previous Archon's corpse had been fed to the crabs in retaliation for his part in the war.
Laenor had called the Conclave to gather and to a man they had been forced to gather.
"Laenor Velaryon," came the first vote, and the second, and the third.
All of the wealthiest and noblest of Tyrosh had been threatened into voting for him. One by one, they cast their votes for him.
"Kieran Adarys," roused a dissenting voice, from a short, stocky man with a yellow beard, that Laenor recognized as voting for himself in defiance. A die-hard who would rather be eaten alive relinquish the republic's freedom to a Westerosi.
And die hard he would.
Laenor nodded to his guards, the man was dragged away and fed to Silverwing. He left the pregnant pause in the proceedings to be filled with the man's screams, and eventual silence.
It was ruthless, but the man had signed his death warrant with his defiance and for his word to be respected, he had to make good on his threats, or else they would walk all over him.
He nodded again and the proceedings continued.
"Laenor Velaryon," came the next vote and the one after that.
No one else voted outside the party line.
He wanted a vote to legitimize his conquest, but nor would he allow dissension when all present had agreed privately to support his candidacy. Those who'd refused beforehand had been packed up and were ready to be shipped to the Wall.
Not that he needed a vote, the Velaryon forces had already completely occupied the city. Tyrosh was his to with it as he pleased.
"And new Archon of Tyrosh, Laenor of House Velaryon, Prince-Consort of Dragonstone," heralded the Conclave's herald.
The robes of the office were soon draped over his shoulders and he stood to address the crowd.
"My first act as Archon of Tyrosh is to swear the city's fealty to Viserys of House Targaryen, First of his Name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm. From this day, until the end of days, I hereby subject Tyrosh to all the laws under the Iron Throne of Westeros," Laenor decreed.
There was murmuring in the crowd and he nodded to Joffrey, and spear tips were soon crashing to the ground to silence them.
"My second act is to enforce the abolition of the abomination that is slavery. From this moment forward, all the slaves of Tyrosh," a full three-quarters of the city's population, "are to be henceforth and forever – free."
This time the crowd did more than murmur and practically revolted, it was only with a deafening roar of Silverwing that the proceedings continued uninterrupted.
"The care of indentured servants is to be remanded to the state."
Westeros and Tyrosh had no legal concept of banning ex post facto laws, so he was free to punish people for crimes committed before they actually became crimes, and he meant to do so.
"All owners of a single slave are to have their property confiscated-"
With that not even Silverwing could silence the crowd, and Laenor had to wait until the guards removed the troublemakers before he continued.
"Confiscated and placed under control of the state. Owners of bed slaves are to be sent to the Wall or the block for the crime of rape. Owners of a dozen or more slaves are to be sentenced to hard labour. Exemptions for the extremely young and old to be made. Capital crimes of rape, torture, and murder against former slaves to be brought forth and judged by a citizen's tribunal on a case by case basis."
His words were being written down by a local scribe, and would soon be printed for the whole city to read. With a stroke, he had just destroyed the ruling class of Tyrosh.
"Thirdly, I do hereby pledge that the citizens of Tyrosh, including those former slaves of the city, will be granted lodgings, food, and water, provided they meet the responsibilities the state requires of them. To each according to their need, from each according to their ability."
The slave economy of the city would have to be replaced with something drastically revolutionary if it were to survive the transition. It wasn't forty acres and a mule, but it should get the job done.
"Next, I proclaim that Tyrosh will not pursue any claims to the Disputed Lands. I will not waste our citizen's blood in an endless war on the eastern continent when our future lies to the open seas."
He did not mean to abandon his advantage of naval hegemony by becoming embroiled in a land war against sellswords. The Disputed Lands weren't going to be a reliable source of food outside of trade anyway. The Reach would feed Tyrosh, and Lys too perhaps, in time. His agricultural advances would soon prove able to produce food bountiful enough to support Tyrosh's current population regardless.
"Finally, I do hereby renounce Tyrosh's membership in the Triarchy and state my intention to sue for peace with the Free Cities of Lys and Myr as well as the Principality of Dorne."
With that, he was finished for the day and took his leave.
The remnants of the Conclave were looking at him with hate in their eyes as he marched out of the hall, but that much had been expected.
They were all slave owners, every one of them.
The Unsullied of the city had been formed into an honour guard for him, he'd freed them as well, but they knew only their trade and he would put the guardsmen to good work, putting order to the city in chaos. It was the least they could do in atonement for slaughtering babes.
As he left the Conclave's Chamber of the Bleeding Tower and made for the Archon's Palace. As he did so, a throng of slaves, former slaves, emerged from their households and began to crowd around him.
Word had already spread through the city of his emancipation proclamation like wildfire, with him having already ordered the levies in the city to free the slaves before he'd entered the chamber.
Laena cried out that they owed their freedom to Laenor Silverwing, the Wind Wyrm, Prince of the Sunset Kingdoms.
He was accosted by a horde of people, of all nationalities, crying out to him in gratitude.
"Kepa!" shouted a silver-haired boy atop his father's shoulders, and the man echoed the shout with one of his own.
"Kepa! Kepa!"
Laenor felt his heart clench, missing his children.
His hand shook like a leaf as he raised it to the crowd, and gave a shy smile.
The small crowd took up the cry, "Kepa! Kepa! KEPA!".
They were reaching out to her, bowing to him, kneeling, prostrating themselves before him.
"Aelallo" some called him, while others cried "Tota" or "Qathen" or "Paelo". Whatever tongue it rang out in, the meaning was the same.
They're calling me 'father'. Just like they had called Dany 'Mhysa', just like they called Gandhi 'Bapu'.
The crowd grew, swelled so large that the cry frightened his guards. He feared that knives were waiting for him in the crowd, but still, he walked into the mass of people. Should anyone try anything in this crowd, the mob would swallow them whole and now was the time to be brave.
He walked to the nearest mount, while all those around him reached out to him, longing for a touch or falling to the ground before him to try and kiss his feet.
Parents pushed forward in the mob to get their children a glance at him, he had to send half his guard into the crowd to keep people from being trampled.
He'd intended to give the speech later, once the clamour of the city had died down, but now was the time to solidify the day's work into the public memory, he took the parchment from inside his armour and began to shout to the crowd in his mother tongue.
"This city was once a jewel of Valyria! A city of life and beauty, and so it shall be once more!"
His Unsullied beat their spear tips to the ground in applause.
"Let the armies of the Triarchy know this, never again shall the people of Tyrosh languish under the tyranny of a slaver's whip!"
The crowd cheered, a sea of people roaring at his every word.
"You, my people, will never have to worry about living in bondage ever again!"
An entire city eating out of his hand.
"Kill the masters! Kill the masters!" a chant began to break out, as a pile of iron collars and fetters appeared at his feet.
"No, no, my friends, you are better than they are! Their property will be yours, you have inherited Tyrosh! Those who have tormented you will be brought to justice! They will be forced to work as they have forced you to work, but even they will not be slaves. You, my people, are honest, Gods-fearing people, and you know slavery to be an abomination, and murder to be a sin!"
Thankfully, the crowd had stopped to hear his words, and had quieted down then cheered uproariously at their promised prosperity and promises of punishment.
"Thank you for electing me Archon of your city! Thank you for making me the father of your nation!"
"Long live Blessed Laenor!" came a cry from the crowd, "The Breaker of Chains!" came another. "Laenor the Liberator!"
"Tyrosh is ours!" he cried.
"Tyrosh is ours!" chanted the crowd.
"You will not have to worry about feeding yourselves or finding shelter! You will not have to worry about finding a job or letting disease wither your children! All those who serve will be served!"
The Black Walls of Tyrosh began to shake as if an earthquake rattled them, such was the booming thunder of applause.
Laena stepped up from behind him and pumped her fist in the air, "Kepa! Kepa! Kepa!"
"KEPA! KEPA! KEPA!" roared the masses.
The crowd must have numbered in the tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands. All the freed peoples of Tyrosh had come to see him.
"Free at last. Free at last! Thank the Seven Above, you are free at last!" he bellowed in High Valyrian.
"Laenor the Emancipator!", "Laenor the Magnificent!" new epithets were being shouted from the crowd at the pause.
"KEPA! KEPA! KEPA!"
They loved him.
He felt like Lincoln, Gandhi, and Elvis all rolled into one.
Lys and Myr refused to surrender, apparently one needed an up close demonstration of a dragon in order to be cowed by one.
No matter. Lys would be blockaded next and surrender sooner or later when they realized their island nation would starve as their ships burned.
Myr would falter soon once it realized it was on its own and faced its two sisters in war.
Mycro Nestoris was brought before him, a representative of the Sealord of Braavos.
"The Sealord congratulates you on your victory and wishes you well in your efforts to end the plague of slavery."
Laenor doubted the Sealord was pleased at his conquest, he'd looked into the man's dreams and seen he was furious, but the abolition of slavery must've forced the man into accepting it, as the Braavosi despised slavery and would not condone an alliance with the Triarchy slavers against the emancipators.
"I thank you, Mycro," Laenor said, "however, we have heard dire reports from Braavos of the Sealord's displeasure."
"I can assure Your Grace, that such reports are unfounded."
"We are most pleased to hear it, yet it would be foolish of me to not state my position most firmly."
"And what position is that?"
"I offer Braavos an alliance, and with that, the city's purple ships will be allowed open access through the Stepstones, free of charge."
"A most generous offer, Your Grace, I will be sure to pass it along to the Sealord posthaste."
Laenor hummed, "Yes, I thought you would enjoy the carrot, so now let me wiggle the stick."
"Stick, Your Grace?"
"Should the rumours be true and the Sealord wish me harm, should a Faceless man harm any member of my family, should any of them be assassinated, should one of them so much as be struck by lightning, I will fly to Braavos, where I will bring the Titan to its knees and burn the House of Black and White to the ground."
"Your Grace is paranoid-"
"Am I understood?"
"Yes, Your Grace."
"Then please, enjoy the festivities, but be sure to relay the message back to your master."
The Triarch of Volantis who visited next was far less amenable and enraged at the abolition of slavery but he too was forced to accept it as what's done is done. So he had no choice but to be mollified by concessions in the Disputed Lands.
The Magisters of Pentos who arrived were likewise coerced into accepting the conquest.
After all, the only way to retake Tyrosh was by sea, and House Velayron ruled the waves.
"The most powerful force in the world isn't dragons, it's compound interest." Corlys quipped as they marched into the lobby of the Tyroshi bank.
Laenor laughed along with his father, yet it had not been the Tyroshi trading cartels that had won the war, but the dragons.
The bank was a magnificent building, resplendent with rich tapestries hanging from the walls and the marble floors glistening with polish.
Thankfully, the Tyroshi had grown lazy.
For every Tyroshi freeman, there were three slaves. The American antebellum South had been a complacent economy when only less than a third of the population had been enslaved. Tyrosh was a slave state and slavery had infested every industry from the bottom to the very top. Even the noblest Valyrian scions of Tyrosh relied on slaves to do their business, and even the wealthiest traders relied on slaves to be bookkeepers and warehouse managers.
Neither was it Mereen, where the economy relied on the slave trade, even if Tyrosh's slavers had been notorious. Nor had Tyrosh salted the earth like Mereen had with their olive groves. Its snail farms, distilleries, and aviaries remained intact, and so its famous dye, pear brandy, and baked honeyfingers were still being produced in droves. Even most of the city's renowned smiths had been slaves, proud to use their own marks for the first time.
No profession in the city wasn't predominated by slaves in some way. Even then, most freemen were poor as you'd expect in a medieval society without a bourgeois class or large population of farmers like in Westeros. Sure, they had all answered to a master once upon a time, but the slavers hadn't realized that instead of striking the head off a snake and killing it, they'd made Tyrosh a hydra and he had easily been able to fill that vacuum.
Some in the city claimed that he had made every Tyroshi his slave, but he doubted those formerly in bondage would agree.
Thankfully the rich folk of Tyrosh kept their money deposited in its bank.
With a stroke, he had confiscated the wealth of the city's elite and began redistributing it. In every corner of the city, the power dynamics of the city were changing. The Tyroshi fleet, what was left of it, had been confiscated along with every ship owned by a slave owner, which is to say the vast majority of them. The city's sellswords were being ferried to the Stepstones to fight pirates. Tyrosh had been founded by the Freehold to control the shipping lanes through the Stepstones, and so it would do so again for House Velaryon.
Businesses formerly owned by slavers had likewise been given over to their former slaves, with Laenor as Archon serving as controlling interest. He'd confiscated the slave plantations and replaced them with tenant farms. Even brothels had been turned into worker coops owned by the city.
Those former slaves who worked the most menial jobs were either paid well or transferred into public sector jobs where they'd work to develop Tyrosh's infrastructure.
So far, the city was functioning remarkably well given the circumstances. For the majority of its citizens at least, far better than it ever had for them.
And he was the richest, most powerful Archon in Tyrosh's history by leagues. The conquest had been well worth it.
There had been some economic fallout at first, but soon the city's working class had become empowered enough that it was more than offset. He remembered reading an article where the American emancipation had led to a bigger economic boom than the introduction of railroads, and it had seemed to be even greater in Tyrosh.
Now, he was in the Tyroshi City Bank.
Its coffers would be used to build a new Tyrosh, giving home and business loans to freedmen. The bankers themselves would do so much more though.
The bankers were already fairly sophisticated, with double-entry bookkeeping and a bureaucracy that dwarfed anything of the sort in the West.
He meant for Westeros to have a national bank, to finally finance his projects properly beyond simply draining his House's treasury every time he wanted to do something. They already controlled the currency, the mints and the budget of the Seven Kingdoms. Why lend out its banking interests to foreign cities with hostile motives? The Faith's condemnation of usury? The Faith already hated him. Hated House Targaryen in truth. They were already Green as grass. No use courting them at the expense of other avenues of support.
The treasury would be relocated to Dragonstone, and the Dragon Bank would be established in the name of Princess Rhaenyra.
The wealth of the bank would enrich their cause immensely, while at the same time driving investment in Westeros, and place smallfolk and lords alike in their literal debt.
Maybe he'd even make a stock market and charge a tax on investments.
The Lady Johanna Swann cut an imposing figure dressed all in black.
"Your Grace," she said as she bowed to him.
She'd come at his request from Lys, where she would one day rule in all but name, but as of now was simply a powerful courtesan.
"My Lady, welcome to an actually free city."
"A thousand blessings on your conquest, Your Grace, though as an honorary Lysene I am honour bound to condemn it."
"And yet you give me your blessing."
"I believe slavery is a pox, as a former slave, I am glad to see anyone free."
She was giving him a sultry look, as if she wanted to take him then and there. A skill of her trade he supposed, she looked so convincing that it was no wonder how she'd ensnared the Lysene.
"How would you like to see the Lysene free?"
"What would you have of me, Your Grace?"
"I mean to do with Lys what I have done to Tyrosh, and when I move the Velaryon fleet to blockade the city, I would like to find its gates open to my men."
The Black Swan smiled.
Her only request was that she should be allowed to assassinate her uncle.
"I will not weep for Lord Swann," Laenor stated.
The Lady Swann moved to his side, and put a hand on his thigh.
"I am flattered, but I'm also a happily married man," Laenor said, gently grasping her hand and moving it back to her side.
"A rare man to find these days," she laughed without offense.
"I try," he quipped.
Yes, a new Lyseni Spring was on the horizon but this time for the sake of good.
The tribunals lasted for ages. Laenor wished he could avoid them.
"Please, Your Grace, I beg of you, I'm innocent!" screamed a man as he was dragged away by the Unsullied, found guilty, and bound for the Wall.
He'd been accused of raping a maid, a former slave of his. The girl hadn't been particularly convincing in Laenor's eyes. There had been holes in her story. The man seemed to be telling the truth that he had never touched any of his slaves inappropriately. Yet Laenor had looked him in the eye and declared him guilty all the same.
The city was braying for blood. Centuries of torment under the master's lash had fuelled a frenzy. It was all he could do to keep them alive by sending them to the Wall to serve in the Night's Watch.
And there simply wasn't enough truth serum to go around, it was too precious an interrogation tool to be used in the courts.
In his heart of hearts, he knew it was wrong, but at the same time, he struggled to have sympathy for slavers in the first place.
"Guilty," read off Father, this time the man had whipped one of his slaves to death – a child. Plenty of eyewitnesses had come forward. It was the hangman's noose for him.
Next came a woman decrying that her possessions had been seized from her, a mistress of a slave-holding household, who argued that it wasn't actually her but her relatives who'd owned the slaves and that her possessions ought to be returned to her. Laenor had to tell her it was the law that slaveholder's property be confiscated, and Laena added that she had owned those possessions in the first place because of her relatives. Ryndoon butt in that she used to own people as property and therefore gave up the right to it.
He'd opened up the position of Gonfaloniere of Tyrosh to an election, and hardly to his surprise, Racallio Ryndoon had been voted in. He'd been an adamant opponent of slavery even before the war stemming from a childhood in bondage, now the purple-haired cross-dresser commanded Tyrosh's sellswords and sat on the tribunal with the Velaryons.
"You should come to bed with me, Your Grace," Ryndoon had told him the day he'd become Archon, "all this commotion must be so tiring for you."
Ryndoon was eccentric... at best. However, despite his eccentricities, he was capable and as loyal as a Tyroshi elite as he could come by.
And he needed an elite Tyroshi, he had beggared most of them and sent much of the rest to the Wall already.
Unfortunately, the greater portion of free Tyroshi had owned another Tyroshi.
That made him unpopular with a great deal of the city. As had burning the vanguard of the Tyroshi fleet. Few wept for the galley slaves that had burned with them...
He'd already sentenced several saboteurs trying to burn one of his dragonships to death and needed to keep a constant watch on the dragons resting in the city.
Magister Quaynis was one of the few prominent Tyroshi left, a man from an old plutocratic family that had personally never owned slaves due to falling in love with a slave girl when he was young and never dishonouring her memory after that.
Quaynis came to him and whispered in his ear, "It would be wise, Your Grace, if you picked out some cases for the free Tyroshi to see your justice going both ways."
Laenor nodded, the freedmen would serve to see the same in his opinion.
"Bring forward Case #42."
A former slave was brought in chains before him.
Corlys read off the charges, "You stand accused of murdering Yanis Antekaron, how do you plead?"
"Not guilty, Your Grace."
Laenor wasn't surprised, "You deny killing the man?"
The man was short, with a shaved head, a now popular style eschewing the elitist dyes of the city, answered him "I killed the man, Your Grace, but it was not murder, he deserved to die. He was my master, a cruel man who would beat us often and harshly."
"That does not mean you may take the law into your own hands."
"Did you not take the law into your own hands when you freed us?"
Damn him. There was a murmur of support from the largely freedmen crowd.
"Tyrosh was an enemy of my House, I conquered that enemy and am imposing the laws of King Viserys of the Sunset Kingdoms. Which includes a moratorium on murder."
"It was not murder, Your Grace!"
"Enough. You have already confessed to your crime, I sentence you to the Wall."
"I would sooner die than serve at this wall with the masters!"
"Serve at the Wall or that can be arranged."
The man thankfully spat at him and began to scream obscenities before he was dragged away to his fate. Laenor was glad he did not go nobly, or else he would have become a martyr, instead, he had shown that he was truly bringing law and order to Tyrosh.
A noble boy came forward next, along with the three former slaves he claimed to have raped him. The boy was bruised and battered, but the men denied it vehemently. He could not take one man's word against three, especially former slaves. He was forced to let them go, and taking pity on the boy, offered him a place serving in Spicetown. He agreed to that at least.
Laenor was done for the day, and left the rest to Father and Ryndoon as he took his leave with Laena.
He needed to go flying.
Ser Humfrey Hasty was dead. Murdered.
The man's head had been cut off and placed in his lap.
Scrawled in blood behind his corpse were the words, "A gift from the Scions of Valyria".
So, he was dealing with terrorists.
"Have his head sewn back on and his body sent back to his house in the Stormlands with full honours," Laenor ordered and his men hopped to it.
"Cowards," scorned Father. "This will not be the last death."
"No, but it will be the beginning of their end."
Laenor was not Dany, helpless against the Sons of the Harpy. He would use his glass candles and the truth serum along with modern counter-insurgency tactics to find the perpetrators. For though this was the seventh murder, it was the first with a suspect in custody.
The man was insistent he wouldn't talk, even under threat of torture.
So Laenor had the man's teeth smashed in and a funnel driven down his throat before he plied him with truth serum.
With that, the man sang like a canary, confessing to the crime and naming his co-conspirators.
He was sure to watch the men scurry about in secrecy, learning all manner of things about their organization, from who was in charge to who was funding them.
Once he'd cast a wide enough web, he swooped in with force.
Ser Hasty would be avenged.
Laenor had them all crucified.
There would be more terrorist cells pop up in the city, but none of them were foolish enough to use the name 'the Scions of Valyria' because that was only associated with resounding failure.
He had the freedmen of Tyrosh form a city-wide neighbourhood watch and offered a bounty on any proven enemy of the regime.
The city wasn't exactly safe, but he figured there was much less death than before when slaves were being executed regularly.
He'd seen it through the glass candle, Prince Qoren was rousing ten thousand men to raid the Marches in support of the Triarchy.
He would need to travel to Sunspear, he needed to make peace or this war might stretch on for years yet.
First, he would plant dreams in Prince Qoren's head of dragonfire and blood.
That should make him more amenable to peace, but he hoped to dangle a carrot along with the threatening stick as well.
As always, I'm super interested to hear what you guys thin, so please leave a review. If you have any questions, ask away, I try to answer them all whenever I get the chance, so check your Inbox eventually and I'll be sure to get back to you.
If you enjoyed it, consider following and favoriting since it'll help other people find the story.
Ascalon451 made a coat of arms based on my description of Laenor's which you can see as the new story image, and I am very grateful.
There's a lot of debate about how the end of slavery affected the South's economy, but from I've read, I personally side with the view that it was an economic boom that was covered by the devastation the war brought. I think that effect would only be exponentially greater in Tyrosh, where there's a much higher proportion of slaves.
I know what I'm doing with Laena now, so the poll's over. Thank you to everyone who participated, though I have to admit its result wasn't binding. You'll see what happens to her as the story goes.