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The salty, smoke-tinged wind of Lys circled endlessly over the jagged reefs of the Stepstones.
Viserys unrolled a sheet of parchment and scanned the words quickly.
When his eyes reached the part about Captain Eltaris and his officers having their tongues cut out and their heads strung up and sent to Tyrosh as a gift, his fingers tightened. The parchment crackled softly in his grip.
Cold murder filled his violet eyes.
Those missing ships had been taken by Euron Greyjoy. The crews had been tortured, mutilated, and beheaded. Their heads were delivered to Tyrosh like trophies.
This was not simple piracy. It was deliberate humiliation. A direct insult to Targaryen power.
Viserys did not roar. He did not lose control. There was only a deep, ocean-like silence.
"Euron Greyjoy."
Tyrosh and the last remnants of Myr had pinned all their hopes on this mad fleet. And at its head stood the exile from the Iron Islands, the self-styled Lord of the Waves—Euron Greyjoy.
The pirate the Three Daughters had hastily named their admiral had not launched the crushing counterattack their governors expected.
He understood the strength of the Volantene navy better than anyone. He knew the Targaryen king sitting behind the Black Wall was nothing like the pleasure-drunk rulers of the Free Cities.
So Euron struck only at shadows. His flagship, the Silence, moved like a shark in deep water—appearing only to hit supply lines, watch posts, and lone ships with lightning speed, then vanishing back into fog and reefs. He never stayed to fight.
He had sunk three Volantene supply ships carrying arrows and pitch, burned two watchtowers on high ground, and even slipped in at night to ambush a patrol of ten Lysene galleys that had switched sides, sending half of them to the bottom.
Every strike was precise, vicious, and cold. Yet Euron stayed hidden in the northern reefs of the Stepstones, never approaching the main city of Lys, never daring to challenge the iron grip on Torture Bay.
That stretch of water was the throat of Lys. Viserys had personally ordered it seeded with iron spikes, sunken wrecks, and fixed scorpions. Even the maddest pirate would not sail into that killing ground.
Viserys stood on the stern deck of Admiral Gemon Goneris's flagship, Storm's Fury.
"Still no sign of the Silence?"
Gemon Goneris bowed slightly beside him, one hand resting on the hilt of his short sword as he stared into the heavy sea mist. "Your Grace, my ships have swept every southern channel. Euron is like a sea snake hiding in the rocks. He shows his teeth, but he never brings his whole body into the light. He won't attack Lys. He won't touch Torture Bay. He won't even face our main battle line."
"He's waiting for an opening," Viserys said quietly. "Pirates never make losing bets. Tyrosh gave him the title of admiral, a third of their gold, and command of the combined fleet. He won't be satisfied just skulking among the reefs."
Goneris nodded.
He had already split the fleet into three parts. The main battle line sheltered in the inner harbor of Torture Bay, guarding the lifeline. Medium galleys patrolled the main channels in a blockade. Light scout ships moved between the islands like eyes and ears.
On shore, three defensive lines had been built. Lysene turncoats and Volantene spearmen worked together, raising arrow towers on high ground and digging pitfalls along the beaches. Sea and land alike had been turned into what looked like an unbreakable wall.
Deep in the northern reefs, hidden from sight, the Crow's Eye was smiling.
Euron Greyjoy stood on the black prow of the Silence. The ship was quiet as a floating tomb. No oarsmen's shouts. No creak of sails. Even the sound of the hull cutting water was swallowed by specially layered hulls.
Behind him waited the Tyroshi fleet, the last Lysene survivors, and the desperate men he had gathered from the Iron Islands and the Stepstones—more than fifty ships in all, like a flock of ravens waiting for orders, hidden in the fog.
"Commander!" a Tyroshi officer whispered. "The Volantenes have locked down the south. Their main fleet sits in the inner harbor, light ships patrol outside, and they have infantry on the beaches. If we attack head-on we'll be surrounded."
"Head-on?" Euron gave a low, mocking laugh, his voice hoarse and strangely seductive, like a siren's whisper. "I never win wars with brute force. I use shadows. I use teeth. I use knives they never see coming."
He pointed toward the southernmost reef in the Stepstones… Dead Bone Island.
It was a small, unmanned rock. The channel was narrow and the waters beneath were thick with hidden reefs.
It had once been a minor supply station for Volantene patrol ships, but because it was remote and poorly defended, Goneris had marked it as a secondary post.
Yet this tiny island controlled the throat of the southern main channel. If it fell, the entire blockade would split open.
"High tide tonight. The fog will be thickest," Euron said, his smile eerie in the dim light. "Tell every ship to douse lights, strike sails, and use only the bottom oars. We won't touch their main fleet. We won't touch Torture Bay. We'll only bite off one of their fingers."
"Dead Bone Island's outpost?" the Tyroshi officer blinked. "That's just a small post…"
"A small wound hurts the most," Euron said softly. "By the time they notice the finger is gone and try to reach for us, we'll already be back in the fog."
"What if they hold it?"
"Hold it?" Euron laughed again, the sound rough and mad. "Goneris is a clever man. He knows he can't catch me. But his master—Viserys Targaryen, that bastard who came crawling back from exile—how long can he keep his temper?"
"His war machine needs gold. It needs victories. It needs our heads to calm his vassals." Euron tossed a gold coin into the air and caught it. "The more impatient he gets, the steadier I become. When he sends his fleet out to die, when he squeezes the last coin from Lys, that's when I'll take Torture Bay in one stroke and send his entire navy to the bottom."
"The Tyroshi governors keep pushing us to counterattack and retake Lys…"
"A pack of fools." Euron spat over the rail. "What do they know about naval war? What do they know about dragons? What do they know about real conquerors? Tell them the time isn't right. Once I've cut off Viserys's claws, Lys will fall back into their hands… though whose hands it ends up in by then is another question."
He looked up at the night sky as if searching for dragons.
"Dragons… Targaryen dragons…" Euron murmured, his single eye filled with hunger and madness. "Viserys, you can guard your fleet. You can guard your city. But you can't guard everything you own. I'm going to take it all from you—your dragons, your women, your crown."
On the Narrow Sea, the wind began to shift.
Midnight came on schedule.
The sea fog rolled in like a great white shroud, swallowing the entire surface.
Visibility dropped below ten yards. The sound of waves slapping against rocks was muffled and steady—the perfect cover for the pirate fleet.
The Silence led the way like a black bolt of lightning, gliding silently toward Dead Bone Island.
Eight of the fastest Ironborn longships followed close behind—narrow, shallow-drafted, perfect for threading through reefs.
The Volantene soldiers at the Dead Bone Island outpost had no warning.
They sat around campfires drinking weak wine, certain no enemy would strike on such a thick, foggy night.
Then the grappling hooks slammed into the wooden walls and Ironborn axes split the gate. Only then did they realize death had arrived.
The fight was short and bloody.
No battle cries. No horns. Only the wet thud of steel biting flesh, the sharp crack of breaking bone, and the choked gasps of the dying.
Euron never even stepped ashore. He stood on the prow of the Silence, watching calmly as his men cut down the thirty-two Volantene soldiers and six Lysene sailors like they were harvesting weeds.
The campfires were kicked over. The wooden watchtower was set ablaze. The flames glowed faintly through the fog like a dying eye.
In less than a quarter hour, Dead Bone Island changed hands.
By the time the signal fire reached the main harbor at Torture Bay and Goneris and Viserys came running from their tents, the sea was already empty.
Euron's fleet had vanished back into the northern fog, leaving only the burning outpost, scattered corpses, and a single Greyjoy kraken banner planted on the rocks.
"He's taunting us," Viserys said, staring at the distant firelight. "He's telling us he can tear open our lines whenever he wants—without ever giving us a real fight."
Goneris's fist slammed into the rail, knuckles white.
His carefully built blockade had been split open with the lightest touch.
Dead Bone Island was small, but losing it stripped the southern channel of its early warning. It told the entire Stepstones that the Volantene shield was not unbreakable.
"I'll send the fleet after him at once!" Goneris growled.
"You won't catch him," Viserys shook his head. "Euron knows these waters better than we know our own hands. While the fog lasts and the tide stays high, our big ships can't enter the reef fields."
The sea wind blew past, carrying the faint scent of blood and smoke.
The Crow's Eye had struck again—precise, vicious, and without losing a single man.
He had not attacked the city. He had not tried to take the bay. He had not challenged the main fleet. He had simply bitten off a small but painful piece of flesh… then slipped back into the shadows.