Pre-Chapter A/N:Another chapter on time? Guess my lock-in is going pretty well. If you haven't already, I recommend turning on notifications for my stuff so you can see when new stuff drops right as it drops. Next four chapters on my patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga)— same username as here and link in bio.
XXXX- LAENA VELARYON
There was something to be said about the efficacy of a Laenor Velaryon wracked with guilt. The dressing down he had received from mother that morning all those moons ago had spurred a change in him. She had seen her brother as a broken man when she went in his rooms. By the time Mother was done with him, he had been forged anew. He was a dress torn and patched with greater fabrics. Clearly broken, but all the more precious for it.
He had turned to his projects with a renewed zeal. Laena stood within one of them now. The complete Sept. This was the greatest Sept in all the world, she was convinced. Laenor said the Lannister Sept would be comparable, but she could not see how. Maybe the Lannisters would have them beat in all the wealth they could have on display, but Laena was convinced that any more gold than this would be nothing but gaudy.
Laenor had managed to strike a delicate balance here. Displaying their wealth without being too heavy-handed with it. The choice of how he displayed the wealth also made some difference. The entire main dome of the Sept was made of glass. So much glass that purchasing it all at current prices would beggar a realm. Then there were the Statues of the Seven. Each one was massive, gazing down upon the congregation like the gods above themselves. The gold he had plated them with gleamed in the light that shone through the glass roof while costing a fraction of what trying to make them with solid gold would cost.
She could already imagine herself being wedded here. Walked to the altar by Mother, presented to Laenor, and then he would remove the cloak she wore and drape his own over her. Both the cloaks would bear the Velaryon sigil, but what would it matter. She was marrying the man she loved, and she could not be happier.
"You like it," he spoke from his position in the corner as he measured the distance between the chairs.
"I love it," she said.
"Good. I wanted it to make you happy," he said while dragging his ruler along the ground and dropping to his knees again.
"Why are you doing that?" she asked.
"Last time I came, I noticed that the distance between the benches was inconsistent. I asked them to fix it. I'm making sure they did," he said. She sighed and placed her hand to her face.
"The floors haven't been swept," she said, looking down at his trousers. They would be stained for sure. He would carry the white knees all day if she did nothing about it.
"Oh. That doesn't matter, I guess," he said, moving on to the next set of benches.
"Are you going to measure the distance between all the benches?" she asked.
"How else would I make sure they have the same distance between them?" he asked like she was being the ridiculous one.
"Alright, that's enough of the Sept for us. Let's go. You said you were building me a ship, yes?" she asked, smirking as he looked up in excitement. So distractible he could be.
"You'll love it," he said, and allowed himself to be dragged away. Of course she knew that he would return without her eventually. He wanted perfection for their wedding and would stop at nothing to get it.
XXXXXXX- LAENOR VELARYON
There was no moon in the sky. The sun as well was gone— it was neither day nor night. Something that lay in the middle but was completely other. The sky itself lay bathed in red and I watched as all the world ended for the seventh night in a row. I knew it was a dream, but what could I do about it. I sat on the steps of the building behind me as I watched fourteen volcanoes erupt as one. I watched their devastating power tear land apart as lava hot enough to melt men and the armour they wore fell from the skies. But none of it touched me.
The first time I had panicked, but now I learned to just watch. I watched as men, women, and children ran from place to place seeking some sort of comfort or haven while the ground beneath their feet fissured and rose while it broke apart. I watched a woman, hand in hand with her daughter— the familiar resemblance supported no other conclusion. The woman ran in front with her daughter behind her.
And like I had seen it happen so many times before, a glob of lava fell from the sky and hit the daughter head on. The woman kept running, daughter's hand in her grasp, not ever noticing that there was no body attached to it anymore. I had tried to shout out a warning to them a few times but just like nothing here affected me, nothing I did could affect them.
The woman herself did not last that much longer. A building collapsed in front of her. She banked to the side and tried to turn a different direction before she looked behind her and noted what she was holding was a hand with no body attached. She stared at the hand in her grasp, shocked. There was nothing on her face as the ground beneath her opened up, swallowing her in its maw.
She was just one casualty among thousands. Even the dragons were not safe. I watched as some of the dragonlords made it to their mounts and began to fly away. Out of the hundreds of dragonlords Valyria had boasted, only about two score were able to make it into the air. And a third of their number were brought back to the ground from the flying lava. I had never thought of what a dragon burning looked or sounded like. I never wished to see or hear it again. And yet here I was. The majestic rulers of the sky were brought low by the volcanoes they had once roosted within.
They were not the ones to suffer the most though. That honour was reserved for those who made the skies proper. Dragons were creatures of sky and flame. They ruled one and produced the other. The volcanoes were intent on challenging both those domains. The air itself was coated with a red gas. It came from the volcanoes.
What it was, I did not know. But I knew that it weighed down the dragons as they attempted to flee with their riders. The red stuck to their skin and that of the riders. The dragons were eaten alive by whatever that red was. I watched as they fell to the ground, and this was where the dream usually ended.
But today was different. The dream kept going. I watched as the red gas ate into a dragon's wing, bringing it to the ground. I took a step forward against my better sense. The red gas was eating through the dragon's hide. The formerly majestic creature with the most beautiful sky blue scales I had ever seen roared in pain and fury— more the latter than the former from what I could tell— and then began to breathe its own flames on itself. The red gas had stuck to it, revealing it to be some sort of dust.
The blue dragon, I called her Skyscreamer, tried her hardest but her flames did nothing to deter the dust as it ate her. She eventually slumped, going still. She lived still, but could no longer move.
It was not until she stayed still and I was close enough that I realised the truth of it. The red dust wasn't a fucking dust. It was moving. Like a horde of termites, it ate through the dragon's hide and then through the flesh that existed within.
I watched as it progressed until it reached its head. The dragon's breaths had slowed as it was consumed all over. I watched the red insects— what else could I call them?— stream across her face and then begin to eat through her eyes. She blinked and I near shot backwards. The eye closed next until the insects ate through her eyelid itself, and then I was in bed again.
I looked up at my familiar ceiling and rolled off the bed. The wedding was coming in less than a moon and things still needed to be completed here and there. I stretched out my hand and a flame formed, cutting through the darkness. I looked around the room, trying to remind myself of all the tasks I had to complete today. The darkness in the room told me it was well before daybreak. Experience told me there would be no more sleep for me tonight so I might as well get to work.
When I dressed and left the room, I felt the absence at my back just as keenly as I had felt it after dressing up on the ship and walking to the deck all those days ago. Of course, Mother had tried to order another escort to follow me around, but this was Bloodstone. The men here listened to me more than they did her. I would not bear the thought of Ben being replaced, and for now I was having my way. Besides, Bloodstone was probably the safest place for a Velaryon these days.
The people loved me. Even those whose family had been lost to Valyria had fallen to their knees thanking me when they received the gold set aside for them. They had gotten it into their heads somehow that I was a passionate and caring leader who held them in his affection. More false words had never been spoken. I cared little for these people in truth.
I saw them as part of the city. Like the bricks that made up the buildings. They were useful in so much that they were what made the city itself tick. They brought life to its streets, sound to its wind, and added flavour to its taste, but beyond that, they were nothing. I did not even see them as individuals. Only numbers given corporeal form to be moved about like pieces on a chess board.
Part of me had died in Valyria. Was it even there or was it on Vaemond's ship after I woke up that part had died? Was it when I broke parley? Or when I stabbed the red witch through the neck and had her tossed overboard? It was difficult to tell. What I knew for sure was that it was gone. And now that it was gone, I felt all the lesser for it.
I walked through the halls of my castle, as much a ghost as a man. I had turned off my fire when I stepped out of my room. The dying beams of moonlight that streamed in through the windows were enough to guide me on my way out. I walked slowly until I reached the courtyard, and from there it was out through the gates themselves.
Igneel was waiting. I hadn't consciously called him, but he knew me well enough by now. My best and oldest friend snorted as I approached, banishing the cold night air with a gust of warmth from his internal furnace.
"Ready to head out, boy?" I asked, rubbing along his neck. A flight was always good for my mood, and going to see the Kingdom I was building sounded like a good time— it always was.
He snorted again, pushing his head against my other hand as I turned my rubbing to more vigorous scratching. It was as if he was saying worry about yourself, not me.
I smiled at the sentiment before moving to mount his back.
The Stepstones were an archipelago of twenty-three islands. Each one different from the others in size, landscape, and topography. I had come up with a plan for getting the most value out of each of them. The first step in that plan had been the lighthouses. To my pleasure, I could spot those beacons of light cut through the sky as Igneel and I flew around our territory.
Some of the islands were useful for little more than that. Acting as places to host outposts for our early warning system, but little more. Others, however, were proving to have an unlimited number of purposes. Crete was a large-ish island with a natural pier and also served as the closest island to Dorne so it needed to be outfitted in preparation for an attack from that end if one was ever to come. The war for the seat of Sunspear had turned cold after moons of flareups.
Yronwood and Jordan staying out of it and becoming wealthier than ever thanks to their trade with me had made the others see sense. The Daynes of Starfall had sent a delegation in the last few months, and I expected that the others would follow suit eventually. Dorne had broken. Either they would ally themselves with me, or with the Iron Throne. But they would not be able to survive in the isolation that they had prided themselves on in the previous decades.
If I had been a more greedy man, I would have hatched a plan to bring that desert into my domain. It wouldn't even be all that hard. Yronwood certainly wanted it. Of course, that was more out of self-interest than anything else— he probably felt that if I conquered Dorne, I would make him its Overlord in my absence. Something akin to a Lord Paramount.
Perhaps he foresaw a world where his children would cast off the yokes mine would place on them and rule a united Dorne in their own rights. I wasn't even interested in seeing what would happen if we went down that path. It just wasn't worth it. All the blood and sweat for what? A desert filled with stubborn nobles too stupid to know a lost battle from a cause worth fighting for? No.
Next to Crete was Naxos. Once an area teeming with life before I had swept down on Igneel's back and burnt the forests and all those who hid within. It would one day become an agricultural hub. When we had the men to till the land in addition to the land already being tilled in Paros where the world's largest potato farm would live for the time being. The hardy crops would see to it that we would not starve even if cut off from Driftmark's bounty. That, in addition to the fishing that was developing down in Samos would be our Panem.
And then we passed the most beautiful of the islands. Shielded from the storms by a mountainous island on either side sat Atlantis. She was pure virgin land for the time being but I knew what she would one day become. The Targaryens of canon had had Summerhall, the Dornish, the Water Gardens. My children and their children would have Atlantis to go to when the pressures of Bloodstone became overmuch.
It was a beautiful flat island. Just grass and trees far as the eye could see. Barely accessible by ship— only small barges could make it through the islands that hemmed it in— and so mostly untouched by man. I could already see dragons roosting all over in my mind's eye. I could envision the palace I would build when I got the chance. Bloodstone was a thing of pure utility. It was a fortress that armies would break against— if they ever made it that far. Atlantis would host a palace. A building dedicated more to pleasure and relaxation than protection from our enemies. I could hear the sound of laughter as I sat on Igneel's back and watched as the sun finally began to rise on her clear blue waters. The laughter of children not yet born.
Children that Laena and I would bring into this world. We would raise them, teach them, and one day they would make mistakes of their own like I did with Valyria. They would kill. They would get others killed. Even in my imagination, I dared not consider the possibility of they themselves being killed. It would shatter me, I knew. Losing Ben had broken something within me. It had hurt more than losing Corlys had. Corlys might have been my father in this life, but I hadn't known him all that well. Ben had spent every waking moment with me since before I was old enough to grow armpit hair. He didn't deserve to die there. He didn't deserve for his last days to be spent nothing more than a prisoner in his own body as he watched me fail to notice that he had been replaced. That was perhaps what hurt the most. My friend had been gone for days and I hadn't even noticed. I'd taken him for granted. The silent spectre at my back. Always seen as a protector, but never as what he deserved to be— a friend. The truest friend a man could wish for.
Igneel growled, drawing me from my thoughts and I turned my attention to something else. The wedding was coming. The day where before man and the gods, Laena and I would swear ourselves to each other. I had gone to Valyria to escape it because I was a coward. Now I stood here, and instead of the fear or dread I anticipated at the thought of tying myself to someone so strongly, it was a sense of anticipation. Laena was more than my sister. She was what tied me to this world for better or worse. My anchor in the storms to come. I loved her, I knew that now. I knew it as surely as I knew the water beneath us was wet. As surely as I could feel the sun's rays on my skin. I couldn't wait to marry her.
A/N: We get a more introspective chapter this time, and move on with the wedding next one. I'll pick a POV for the wedding and expect us to stick with that. Next four chapters up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga) (same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.