"So it's true, then?" Cassandra asked as Argella was being fitted in her armor, the magnificent white-and-gold plate that Harald had gifted her.
Argella sighed sadly. "Yes, it would seem so."
Cassandra sat down heavily on a nearby chair as if struck. "Poor Queen Sharra. How could they do this to her?"
"It seems traitorous lords are an epidemic none can cure," Argella said bitterly. "A woman ruler, it seems, is something most of Westeros simply cannot abide."
It was after the feast yesterday when they had received the news from the Vale.
Queen Sharra and her sons, King Ronnel and Prince Jonos, had been betrayed by the lords of the Vale, led by Ser Artys Arryn, a cousin to the late King Jon Arryn.
Artys had assembled a coalition of the Vale's most powerful lords—the Royces, the Corbrays, the Hunters, the Belmores, and others—and marched on the Eyrie. They had demanded that Sharra step down as regent to the king and accept Artys as the new regent in her place, claiming that a woman could not properly guide the realm in these dangerous times, that masculine strength was needed to protect the Vale from Harald, who they claimed would soon invade.
Sharra had refused, standing firm despite the armies at her gates.
And to her horror, she had been betrayed from within. Someone in the Eyrie itself—a captain of the guard, some said, bribed with promises of land and title—had opened the gates to Artys and his coalition. The lords had stormed the castle, and Artys had proceeded to imprison Sharra and her children in their own home, proclaiming himself the new Lord Regent for King Ronnel.
"I fear it will only end in tragedy," Argella said quietly.
"Surely not," Cassandra protested. "That traitor would not... he wouldn't harm the Queen or the children, would he? They're royal blood! They're family!"
"Power can make men do vile things, Cass."
"And now Artys will send Valemen to die against the Heartlands," Cassandra said with disgust.
Argella laughed, a short, bitter sound. "The Vale might be added to the Heartlands if he is truly that mad. Harald defeated thousands of Ironborn and Stormlanders alone. What does Artys think his mountain knights will accomplish?"
Maria, who had been listening silently while adjusting a strap on Argella's pauldron, spoke up. "Queen Sharra was a lovely woman. She even sent you those letters, remember? Advised you on how to rule, especially as a woman in a realm of men."
Argella smiled as she remembered those letters—kind words from one queen to a would-be one, offering wisdom and solidarity. They would have continued their correspondence if not for everything that had happened in the last two years.
"It is done, Your Grace," Ser Finnigan Mertyn said as he finished helping her with the final pieces of armor.
"Thank you, Ser Finnigan," Argella said graciously.
The knight bowed and left, leaving the three women alone in the chamber.
Cassandra walked around Argella, examining the armor critically. "Do you plan to go to the Isle with His Grace dressed like this?"
"That is exactly what I plan," Argella confirmed.
Maria and Cassandra exchanged knowing glances, then both grinned mischievously.
"Oh, is this your way of seducing the King?" Maria teased. "Showing up in armor that makes you look like a warrior goddess?"
"I hear His Grace likes this sort of thing—likes a woman who shows strength," Cassandra added with a laugh. "And you do look rather... commanding in that."
Argella felt her cheeks warm. "You speak as if Harald and I are not already betrothed to be married."
"Oh please, Ella," Cassandra said, waving a hand dismissively. "You have been fantasizing about bedding that man since the moment you met him. Don't think we haven't noticed the way you spoke about him after your magic lesson."
"I have not!" Argella protested, though her blush deepened.
"It's a good sign that the King and the Tully woman's liaison has ended," Maria said more seriously. "At least you won't have to share."
"She is still here, is she not?" Cassandra pointed out. "Leader of his new order of healers. His first student in magic."
Argella made a face. She did not have anything against Elsa Tully personally—the woman was competent, intelligent, and genuinely devoted to helping people. But the relationship she had shared with Harald, even though it had ended moons ago, still irked Argella, especially now that they were to be married.
The thought of Harald perhaps restarting it with Elsa again made something hot and angry coil in Argella's chest.
She cut the thoughts off sharply. This was foolish. Childish, even.
"It's time to go," Argella said firmly, pushing the uncomfortable feelings aside.
Cassandra took the ornate stag helm and followed Argella, along with Maria, who carried a cloak in case the weather turned.
They made their way from Castle Cyrodiil on horses, riding down the winding road to the docks below. It was a half-hour journey, and by the time they arrived, the morning sun was fully risen.
A ship was waiting at the dock, and so was Harald, his expression one of patient waiting until he saw Argella approaching.
Then his eyes widened with surprise.
"I did not expect you in full armor," Harald said as she dismounted and walked toward him.
"How do I look?" Argella asked, unable to keep a hint of challenge from her voice.
Harald did not respond immediately, only staring at her.
"You look..."
"Beautiful," Argella supplied as he stopped midway.
"Formidable," Harald finished, and there was something in his voice admiration, perhaps, or approval. "You look like the Storm God's daughter come to reclaim her throne."
He stepped closer. "Are you ready for this?"
Argella simply walked ahead toward the ship, her confidence surging. "I have been waiting for this for moons, Harald. Let us not delay any longer."
She boarded the ship without looking back.
It was time to awaken the storm in her blood.
=========
The Isle of Faces was strange.
A chill ran down Argella's spine as Harald led her through the many weirwoods toward what she could see was perhaps the oldest of them a massive tree whose trunk was wider than three men with arms outstretched, its bone-white bark ancient and gnarled, its blood-red leaves rustling in a wind she couldn't feel.
She could also see traces where weirwood had been cut down and burned, perhaps by the Ironborn during their occupation. In Cyrodiil, there were many pieces of furniture made from weirwood—tables, chairs, decorative panels all taken from the ruins of Harrenhal.
She thought of the ancient Durrandons, of when they were still fully First Men. The Stormlands must have had thousands upon thousands of weirwoods like this scattered across its lands back then. Yet only one remained in Storm's End now, after thousands of years of Andal rule.
Harald spoke as they walked, his voice quiet in the sacred grove. "Are you ready?"
Argella huffed slightly. "You have asked that many times now. The answer still remains yes."
"It was easier for Elsa," Harald said carefully. "But it might not be that easy for you."
"Due to me being a Durrandon," Argella said, understanding immediately.
"Yes," Harald confirmed. "Yours, along with the Starks', have the most magic in your bloodlines. During the ritual, you may find yourself seeing visions of your oldest ancestors—the ones who still followed the Old Gods, before the Andals came and brought the Seven."
Argella's eyes widened.
Will they accept me? she thought with sudden anxiety. Or will they reject me, seeing me as nothing more than a betrayer of their old ways? I do pray to the Old Gods now, as I have converted to the covenant.
What if they…
"Don't worry," Harald said, as if sensing her thoughts. "You will do fine."
Argella looked at him. "What makes you so brave? How do you face all of this without fear?"
Harald laughed. "Everyone feels fear, Argella. Even me."
He paused, his expression growing more somber. "I have a gap in my memory, something that happened that I don't know what it is. The memory has been removed somehow—by whom or what, I don't know. But every time I try to think back on it, every time I probe at that empty space in my mind, I get a terrifying feeling. The most fear I've ever felt, like staring into an abyss that stares back."
"That's unsettling," Argella said quietly.
"I know," Harald agreed. "But fear doesn't mean you stop. It just means you're aware of the stakes."
They arrived in the oldest grove, where the earthsingers were waiting for them—five women in simple robes.
One of them, the eldest, stepped forward. "We are ready to begin when you are, Storm's daughter."
Harald nodded, then motioned for Argella to go with them.
Argella was led into the shadow of the largest weirwood, and the earthsingers gestured for her to lie down on the exposed roots, which formed a natural cradle.
She did it, even though fear and hesitation coursed through her veins like ice water. But those feelings were overwritten by stronger ones thoughts of revenge and anger. Anger at the traitors who now held and bled her homeland. Anger at Ormund and Baldric and Lyonel, who tore the Stormlands apart for their own ambitions. Anger at Swann, who had whispered poison and manipulated her father.
That anger burned hotter than any fear.
"We shall now begin," the earthsinger said, kneeling beside her.
The woman pressed her finger to Argella's forehead, and Argella knew no more.
When she woke—or thought she woke—she found herself in a familiar place.
She was standing on a cliff overlooking the sea, storm clouds gathering on the horizon. The wind whipped around her, carrying the salt spray and the promise of rain. She recognized this place somehow, though she had never been here before.
Shipbreaker Bay, something whispered in her mind.
She saw a man and a woman meeting on the clifftop. They looked as though they were meeting in secret, glancing around to ensure they were alone.
The man was tall and powerful, with dark hair and brown eyes that reflected the storm clouds. He wore simple clothing, the garb of a warrior, with a bronze sword at his hip.
The woman was impossibly beautiful, with hair that seemed to flow like the wind itself, and eyes the color of lightning blue. She wore a dress that moved as if in a constant breeze, and when she stepped, she seemed to glide rather than walk.
Argella felt time move as she watched their meetings continue, as their love grew. Secret encounters on the clifftop, stolen moments between duty and desire. The woman would arrive on the wind itself, appearing as if from nowhere. The man would wait for her every evening, watching the horizon until she came.
Finally, she saw them decide to marry in secret, to bind themselves to each other despite the impossibility of it.
Argella watched their union—saw them come together as man and wife, saw the woman give him her maidenhead beneath the stars, saw her choose mortality for love of him.
Argella realized: It's Elenei, the goddess of the wind. And Durran Godsgrief, the first Storm King.
The vision shifted.
She saw Elenei's father—the Sea God, in all his terrible majesty—rage at his daughter's choice. She saw him destroy Durran's castle during their wedding, sending waves higher than mountains crashing down, killing all of Durran's family, his friends, everyone who had celebrated with them.
Everyone except Durran and Elenei.
She watched Durran build castle after castle, each one destroyed by the gods' fury. Six times he built, and six times the storm and sea tore down what he raised.
Finally, she saw a man resembling a Stark tall, grey-eyed, solemn arrive with many earthsingers. Together, with their aid and the magic of the earth itself, they helped Durran construct the last castle.
Storm's End.
She watched it rise, stone by stone, woven with magic and mortal determination. She watched the gods rage against it, sending their strongest storms, their highest waves. But this time, the castle stood.
And Durran, standing on his walls with Elenei at his side, named himself the Storm King.
Argella felt something awakening in her blood, like lightning building before it strikes. Her surroundings began to crackle with electricity, bolts of lightning striking the ground around her, illuminating the vision in brilliant white flashes.
Then she saw them all.
All of her ancestors, stretching back through the centuries. Dozens of them, hundreds of them a line of Storm Kings and Queens.
And at the head of them, Durran and Elenei walked toward her, Elenei's eyes glowing with divine light.
They all converged on her, the spirits of her ancestors flowing into her like a river of power. Memories that weren't hers flashed through her mind battles won and lost, loves found and mourned, oaths sworn and kept.
Elenei reached her first, still impossibly beautiful even as a spirit. She pressed her finger to Argella's forehead.
"Go forth, my daughter. Reclaim what is yours."
Argella woke with a gasp, her entire body arching upward as power flooded through her veins.
The earthsingers had stepped back, watching with wide eyes and satisfied expressions.
Harald stood nearby, and when she turned to look at him, she saw him smiling.
"Welcome back, Storm Queen," one of the earthsingers said. "How do you feel?"
Argella pushed herself up without anyone's help, though she stumbled forward slightly, her legs unsteady beneath her. But it wasn't weakness, it was the sheer, overwhelming sensation of power coursing through every fiber of her being.
She remembered her lessons from Harald, the exercises he had taught her over the past months. She raised her hands, palms outward, and pushed.
Waves of lightning erupted from her fingertips brilliant blue-white arcs that crackled through the air and struck the ground twenty feet away, leaving scorch marks on the earth and setting the grass ablaze.
She stared at her hands in wonder, mystified by what she could do. Her eyes gleamed with something between awe and hunger.
She tried again, concentrating, feeling the power respond to her will like a faithful hound.
Her eyes widened as it happened once more, this time even stronger, the lightning branching and forking as it tore through the air.
"Hah!"
The sound rang out, bright and sharp, then broke open into something bigger.
"Hah… hah… hahaha—!"
It surged upward, carried by the storm inside her. She unleashed lightning toward the sky, watching it arc upward into the clouds, illuminating them from within.
"HAHA… HAHAHA!"
She laughed, unrestrained. Exultant. Thunder given voice.
In her mind's eye, she saw them Ormund, Baldric, Lyonel, Swann. She saw them kneeling before her, saw their faces twisted in terror as lightning danced across her fingers, saw their armies breaking and running before the Storm Queen's fury.
"HAHAHAHAHAHA!"
She couldn't stop laughing pure, unrestrained joy mixed with exhilaration and power and a hunger she had never felt before. She felt powerful in a way she couldn't describe, couldn't put into words.
She turned to look at Harald, who stood there grinning proudly.
She walked toward him, her steps more confident now, lightning still dancing across her fingertips, her eyes still glowing faintly. She stopped in front of him and, with a confident smile, reached up, grabbed the front of his armor, pulled him down, and kissed him.