Visenya Targaryen (296 AC)

To be entirely honest, she should have noticed that Maron had far fewer qualms about sailing into the doom then he did going down the Zamoyos river. Or the fact that he had spent five moons on reinforcing every last ward on the ship, turning it from a well defended vessel into what amounted to be something harder to take than a castle before even thinking of going near there. Or that he had all but forced everyone to wear amulets to ward off... well, mainly vermin and disease, though they should also help with poison. Animal toxins and the spores of plants and mushrooms as opposed to volcanic fumes.

And now, as they sailed the fuck AWAY from that green hell, she rocked back and forth. She had tried, she had tried to purge it with fire, but it did not take. To be sure, she had seen wonders and horrors the likes of which few of her house ever had, but she just wanted to cuddle her little sister and drown out some of the whispers, the whispers that clung to her like tar even with the purification rites and protections. She just wanted to cuddle and drink some hot chocolate and whimper and not go back.

Oh, there were moments when she enjoyed herself, she would not lie, as her blade drank of wyverns and great lizards, as she butchered apes that would have towered over many a great building... but between the city of Yeen and some of the spiders... not even the one serpent that had swallowed her whole, its breath and gullet reeking of toxic acids really scared her, for she had been able to cut her way out of the beast. No, the spiders that seemed all too human at times and the wyverns were what left the deepest wounds after the accursed city.

The wyverns resembled dragons, and yet were not the great and mighty beasts her ancestors rode. No, the Brown Bellied ones were small, no larger than many of the monkeys, but the sheer number of them as they swarmed! If not for the mystic nature of her armor, she would have been torn apart as they flew around her, a great spinning cloud that lifted her into the air with their claws and teeth as they chittered and screamed and roared. For brief moments, she 'flew,' as she had to get out, as they were being swarmed.

Though they focused on her, and she could hear hate in their tones, hate and loathing and hunger. She shivered, rocking back and forth, Dany rolling her eyes as she was squeezed tight into her elder sisters chest. But at least the wyverns had only tried to kill her, to eat her. Not like the spider, as she watched it peel a woman in rags, the survivor of a shipwreck, out of her clothes before it raped her, screams silenced into gurgles as her womb was bloated to the point of near bursting from the spiders eggs.

If the others had not gotten there in time, she would have been next, claws on her armor, ready to peel and open her. And yet, it was still better in some respects than Yeen and what was lurking there. If not for Maron... she whimpered, sister letting out a sigh as she was given a boob hat. Yes, Dany was safe, she was fine, she was alive, and she was her big sister, not her big brother that took her and ate her, cracking open her bones and belly for the sweet and rich meat as the thing that wasn't a real dragon hatched from his skin...

It wasn't real. None of what happened there was real. She was safe. She was safe. She was not going to hurt her precious little sister. She was not going to hurt her family and gorge herself on the ashes and blood. No, as her little sister snuggled close, as Visenya closed her eyes, the dozens of heatless fires destroying all shadows in the room, that was not her, and she would not end up like that.

She would not. She could not.

Missandei

She was, if she would be honest, happy that she was able to return home with two of her brothers, their manhoods restored by the Grey-Joy's magic. To be sure, she had been less pleased that the good captain and the others had sailed down the dark river and into the green hell, but they had returned mostly intact and not consumed by disease or madness, which from what the elders had said, was a rare thing and so they must be blessed by the gods. Which ones, they were not sure, but it was agreed on that Maron Greyjoy was a generally good omen.

That a part of his gifts to them had been magical defenses to make things harder for the raiders to come again merely cemented things in the minds of many. And it had not escaped her that he had recognized her on sight when he had first met her, that he knew her name. Sorcerers knew things that common men and women would be wise to leave be, and yet she wondered... what was it that drew his eye to her? He was not interested in bedding her, for at nine he claimed she was too young.

Yet, and this was the thing, as she approached him as he sat with the elders as they drank and talked of things far less serious than business in the light of the afternoon sun. It was largely fishing actually, which made her internally nod. While he was a sorcerer... he was also very much like a normal man in many respects, and far less like the Good Masters. Yet, she merely sat down, her grandfather frowning. "This one wonders if she can go with you and learn from your library?"

Oh, the fact that the elders choked, the coconut wine spraying as they looked at her boldness? Even as her grandfather opened his mouth, it was Maron that spoke. "As a student, apprentice or a member of the crew?" He was taking her seriously, storm grey eyes looking into eyes of molten gold with no hesitation or discomfort. "Or are you looking to pursue a longer term arrangement?"

She blinked, as she had not actually considered the last one, and the images it conjured in her head given what she had seen in Astapor. "As a student, though I know I would have to earn my keep. But... longer term arrangements?"

She blushed, as he smiled, knowing and teasing, eyes looking to her grandfather, HIS own expression annoyed and just a touch angry. Still, Maron nodded, one eye on her grandfather. "Yes, because I have returned you to your people, I am not going to steal you away. Rather, I would be wondering if the custom of bride price would be followed here, or if it would be considered in poor tastes given the circumstances?"

Those being that she had been a slave, captured in a raid and taken from home? It was grandfather that snorted. "Oh, you would marry her? Given the fact that you possess a number of princesses on your ship? I did not think you sunset people took more than one wife."

The talk of marriage cause a pleasing warmth to spread in her cheeks, as he laughed. "Ah, things are a touch different in the Iron Islands. But, I ask because if she is joining my household, well..." Those eyes seem to deepen as he looks at her, and she holds herself still and firm as he weighs and examines her. "It would be right to compensate her kin, given how I roam far and wide."

There was nodding... and then the negotiations began, to see what he would gift and pay for her. As if she was still worthy of having a bride price. She smiled, as this meant that she would still have access to that wonderful library.