The Grind (Book 2) Ch.36

[PENTOS II (Dany II/Neville III)]

— Daenerys —

A slender figure, too slender. Fine features, too fine. A mind, body, and soul haunted, too haunted, by all she’d endured, by the only life she could live.

Pale skin, pure and pristine like freshly-fired porcelain, despite a life on the run. Glittering waves of hair, at once both silver and gold. And those telling, telling eyes…

Valyrian beauty. Targaryen beauty, Viserys would claim. Just a portion of everything that set them above the masses, that made them royal and divine.

Her breasts were bare handfuls, but symmetrical and proportional to her slender frame. Perfect. Many would consider her so, Dany knew. From her lovely legs to her slim and soft stomach. From a face to ‘inspire wars’ to hips and a womb that would ‘birth royalty’. Valyrian perfection. Targaryen perfection.

Viserys never missed the opportunity to say the words that should’ve been so sweet. Whenever he did, something would flinch within her. He never noticed, never truly saw her past that supposed perfection. To him, to too many others, she was only the vessel of perfection. Nothing more…

Dany stared into the silver mirror. Violet eyes, Targaryen eyes, stared back at her. Her kind servants bustled about behind her, preparing her to face the day.

Dany couldn’t help but think of a knight girding himself for war. It felt the same. Dany anticipated that her day would also be one of violence and terror and hostility. A battlefield that she alone could brave.

Lovely Matron Lia ran gentle hands down her arms. Unlike she usually did, Dany leaned into the touch. Her kind servants had broken down her barriers. They meant her no harm, Dany knew. None at all. They wished to help, wished to see her happy, whole, and hale. It was just a shame they had little power to make those wishes real…

“You’re too skinny, my Princess,” Lia tutted. “A beauty like you could do with more meat on her bones.”

“Food,” Dany replied softly, barely a whisper. “Has not always been in such ready supply, Lady Lia.”

The look in Lia’s eyes was as gentle as her hands on Dany’s skin, “Yes, I’m aware, darling little one. I’ve been through the same, those times of scarcity. But here, you may rest your weary head. You are among friends. Sisters and a mother who only want the best for you, I swear.”

“I-…” Dany hesitated. She so wished to believe. She did, despite herself. But saying it aloud invited something, someone… to take it all away. Still, she couldn’t resist.

“… I know.”

Lia hummed, saying nothing of Dany’s whisper or the weakness it admitted. It didn’t need to be acknowledged to be real to those who mattered then, to Dany and her kind servants. Doing so too openly would’ve been dangerous, anyway, Dany knew. No matter how much she wanted to, she had no real way of protecting her new servants from those with callous intentions.

Lia watched over her girls as they worked. Her daughter, Mora, brushed Dany’s hair with delicacy and care. Another of the younger servants, Ophil, pampered her with sweet oils and perfumes. The last and youngest, a girl Dany’s age named Juno, prepared the supple silks Dany would wear. All of them cared. They cared so much that Dany could only ache within.

“You’re like a doll, Princess,” Lia observed. “So obedient, so easy to mold to my masterful vision.”

It was said happily. Kindly. It wasn’t a compliment.

“It is all I know…” Dany said softly. “… All I can know, Lady Lia.”

Lia’s acknowledgement of her ever-present reality came without disapproval, just sadness, “I know, Princess. I know.”

Dany dearly hoped it was true. That Lia and her girls understood like no one else did. Even hosted in the heights of Essosi luxury beside her brother in all his schemes for support, Dany had always been… alone. She’d never had kind servants to call her own, never had anyone like Matron Lia or her girls. Now that she did, Dany yearned for them to never leave.

Since arriving in Magister Illyrio’s manse, Matron Lia had been assigned to her every need. And that… that meant she’d seen… When Viserys called for her, Lia and her girls were there in the background. When Dany had been treated to their gracious host’s presence, they’d been lurking a few steps behind. And when Dany was alone, they… they’d seen her. They must’ve.

“You know,” Lia hummed. “I’m no lady, Princess. I never have been. My youth was spent in a silken pleasure house in Lys. Then, I had my Mora and decided I didn’t want that life for her. I came here to Pentos, and eventually, found… work… with Magister Illyrio. In the end, though, I was just trading a cage of pleasure for chains that aren’t so limited in scope.”

“Chains…?” Dany asked. “I… I thought you were free? All I’ve heard says Pentos doesn’t practice slavery. You are servants, not slaves, no?”

“Oh, darling,” Lia sighed. “The world is not so simple, not nearly. The title does not make a slave. Circumstances, situation, and reality do. Chains are alive and well in Pentos, hidden beneath polite fiction. The Braavosi may impose their noble laws, but many Pentoshi, especially the magisters, keep themselves high, high above it.”

“And…” Dany hesitated. “And Magister Illyrio…? Does he hold himself above those laws as well? More importantly, is… is he good to you?”

“He is typical,” Lia shrugged. “I have suffered worse men. I have loved better. However, he would not dare harm or demand from you, Princess. Not while you are so valuable. So through you, my girls are safe from the worst he could ask of them. I hope you can forgive my selfishness there, darling, but thank you.”

Dany… didn’t quite know what to say to that, didn’t feel like she deserved the thanks, “I… I haven’t done anything, Lady Lia…”

“And it is still enough,” Lia firmly reassured. “We are yours now, Princess. And that means we matter. By yourself, you have already saved four chained souls.”

Something sparked and flickered in Dany’s heart at those words. Hope, gratitude in return, a sense that she’d done something. It was a new feeling for her. A lovely feeling, she thought, to matter to someone and to have made a difference in their life. She wanted to do more for Lia and her girls, but Dany didn’t know how…

“A-Anything you need, Lady Lia…” Dany murmured. “If I can make it so, I will. You’ve been kind to me, truly kind. If possible, I would repay that kindness with kindness of my own.”

“I know, Princess,” Lia said softly. “But I wouldn’t ask so much of you. As I said, you’ve already done enough. We are already yours, make no mistake. Come, put such worries from your mind. Don’t forget your own troubles for ours. The days ahead of you won’t be easy, but so long as I am by your side, I promise to do all I can to ease them for you.”

“Lady Lia…” Dany blinked, suddenly finding her vision blurry.

That someone who was already bearing hidden chains could be so… so kind… Dany didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to thank her. She was moved to tears to be showered with such love. In the end, she said what she could, promising to carry that kindness with her forevermore.

“I… I won’t forget this, Lady Lia. Never. I know not where I will end up in this life of mine… but so long as I can, you will end up there with me. You and your girls. I would give you all that I can. I would make you a lady in truth. I would return all you have given me and so much more. This I promise, Lady Lia. I only need the power to do so.”

Lia chuckled, “You shall reach it eventually, Princess. I suspect greatness and power are inevitable for your future. It is only a matter of what you will endure to get there. You’ve endured much already, I know, but carry on, carry on. Don’t let the world break you before you reach your truest potential. That would be a tragedy unlike any other.”

The care, the kindness, the love… Dany’s tears came without respite. Terrible things that tracked mourning for all she was down her face. For it wasn’t her dear brother who saw her first, nor was it any of those who hosted them and claimed to support their dreams. No, it was a kind matron — a pleasure slave turned chained servant — who saw Dany past the Targaryen name and Valyrian beauty; it was lovely Lia who seemed ready and eager to claim Dany like a daughter of her own blood — not for profit, but because she cared.

Brushing Dany’s hair, Lia’s daughter, Mora, hugged her. Dany leaned into the embrace, fleeting by necessity. It didn’t feel temporary, though. It felt like acceptance and acknowledgement, like Lia and her girls were determined to stay.

Dany’s whole soul started to settle, just a little bit. Her tears ran their course. Not suppressed too soon, as they so often were for Dany, just no longer necessary. She was among friends, among her ladies, among family in all but blood. As she realized that, Dany also realized that there was no need to cry.

The moment faded, but never fully passed. Ophil cleaned her face with tender hands. Mora lovingly arranged her hair. Juno began to dress her in silk and softness. And to fill the comfortable silence, Lia began to gossip.

Dany savored the petty and not-so-petty information that was shared. It wasn’t often that she might know more than her brother. Everything in her life had always been so controlled, so filtered through him. The change of pace, brought on by her ladies, was a welcome one.

“The Dothraki have reached the city, Princess,” Lia informed her.

She hummed sweetly as she did, and the news didn’t feel so heavy when it came from her lips without expectation or agenda. Lia wished for her to know, to clutch at some semblance of agency through information, nothing more.

“Khal Drogo is an infamous man, even among the horse lords,” Lia continued. “He heads a host in the thousands, coming for what he was promised by Magister Illyrio. You, my darling little one. He comes for you. There is no way around that truth.”

Slowly, Dany nodded, “I know… Viserys seems to think it won’t come to that, though. He… He has new plans on his mind.”

“Refusing a khal is no simple task,” Lia cautioned. “There is a reason Pentos appeases them so often. If they don’t get what they think they’re due, things become very bloody, very quickly.”

“Viserys is just as stubborn…” Dany muttered, worrying at her lower lip. “And here, now, he has seemingly been seized by a new direction for us.”

“Magic, Princess, can be a terrible thing,” Lia said, barely more than a whisper. “It is in your blood, in the blood of Old Valyria, none would deny that. But it’s been all but gone from the world for centuries. I cannot predict what will happen now that the Prince has awoken to those flames…”

“Neither can I…” Dany whispered back.

“Have you… Have you felt such stirrings, Princess?” Young Juno hesitantly asked.

“Not like my brother,” Dany admitted. “I feel… something is missing, some core component… Perhaps there is no true fire in my blood… Perhaps I am truly hopeless…”

“I doubt that, Princess,” Lia chuckled almost knowingly. “The gods can be cruel, but not so cruel as to ignore a soul of your caliber. If you feel yourself missing something, it is only a matter of finding it. I know you can. No, I know you will. Perhaps the missing pieces are even close at hand.”

“Close…?” Dany repeated. “I have felt a… pull, a call, since we arrived in this manse. I thought it was my blood to Viserys’s, but it persists even in his company. It leads deeper within these walls, to places I have not been allowed to tread.”

“The Magisters of Pentos claim riches and treasures beyond belief,” Lia told her. “They covet them, hoarding them away so only they might enjoy them. Now, however, some may just be seeing the light of day again…”

“What has changed?” Dany asked, unable to help her curiosity.

“Magic waxes, Princess,” Lia reported. “I’m sure you’ve noticed as well. It is not just limited to your princely brother. The followers of the Lord of Light claim more and more potency in their workings by the day. As do other faiths, though to a lesser extent than the Firetenders. I know a ‘servant’ who was beaten to death for daring to show such power before his magister. And I’ve heard tales that some magisters seek to force the issue for themselves, of course, with those treasures long lost, but none have been successful.”

“Truly?” Dany felt her breath catch in awe. Trepidation quickly followed, however, “That… sounds like trouble. Things the magisters can’t control won’t be welcome, will they? Do you expect the city to throw itself into chaos, Lady Lia?”

“I won’t lie to you, Princess,” Lia said. “It already has, to a degree. There has been… unrest, both in violence and in word. The magisters suppress it, everything they cannot chain, in any way they can. They strive for control in uncontrollable times. But I believe it is only a matter of time before that suppression turns back on them.

“This waxing is not limited to Pentos. Travellers bring news and evidence of it elsewhere, too. Impossible feats of magical artifice in Myr. Strife backed by magic trickling into Tyrosh from the nearby Stepstones. An almost ritualistic revolution of sex and sorcery in Lys, rising far past what they are already known for. The Old Blood of Volantis locking themselves within their famous Black Walls for reasons unknown. Tales of stallion champions amongst the Dothraki, of strength tamed and broken from the backs of their horse gods.

“Even a suspicious surge of reverence and respect when Braavos’s House of Black and White is spoken of, as if they once more move in force like they did in the falling, final days of Valyria…”

Dany’s awe returned; she couldn’t stop it. The rumors Lia shared, stories of magic and mystery from all across the land, were fascinating. Something from a dream, or a nightmare, Dany didn’t know. But they were certainly like nothing she’d ever heard.

“It sounds like Pentos is bearing the least of these changes,” Dany observed.

Lia laughed, “That is always the case with far-off rumors, Princess. Exaggeration, spectacle, and bias of choice, for only the most noteworthy stories would reach us. I doubt Pentos is truly lagging behind, even if the magisters try their best to stick their heads in the sand.”

“’Tis true, my Princess,” Ophil said. Dany liked her voice, sweeter than any song, though she didn’t hear it often. “Especially these past few days. My sister is… favored… by Magister Aricos.”

Dany heard the spite Ophil’s sweet voice put into that word. Empathetically, Dany’s brow furrowed. She reached for Ophil, but the usually demure beauty just smiled sadly and continued.

“She came to me this morning to tend the aftermath of her night with him. He was… rougher than usual, on the back of concerning news. Another magister, a friend and ally of Aricos, lost everything, apparently. And not in the usual ways. His estate, his wealth, and his ‘servants’ abruptly vanished into the darkness two nights past. Nothing was left, except that magister standing where his estate once stood and babbling like a newborn. His mind, it seems, went the same way as everything else.”

Even Lia blinked at that, “Oh my. I had heard about the magister who was killed in the street by Braavosi bravos, but not that one.”

“I heard another was killed by a Faceless Man,” Juno contributed.

The news was almost impossible to wrap her head around, but Dany still stuck her nose up at those magisters’ memories and managed to say, “For your sister’s sake, Ophil, I hope that Magister Aricos is next.”

Ophil smiled softly and hopefully, “As do I, Princess.”

Lia laughed lightly, shaking her head, “See? Pentos is not truly lagging behind in impossible events. We must simply look around us to know that much.”

“And to hope, Mother,” Mora said. “Pyra told me that Yvonne told her that Mazikin told her that her family’s debt was bought out this morning. Some new ship in the harbor, some Braavosi with heavy purse strings, so you know she’s now free. And Mazikin’s wasn’t the only story Pyra told. I don’t think Braavos is happy about Pentos skirting its decrees. That… That is reason to hope, no?”

Lia slowly nodded, brows furrowed in consideration, “Perhaps, perhaps… Keep your eyes and ears open, girls. For ourselves and our princess. There is opportunity here, in this changing chaos. I can feel it. Opportunity for escape, for freedom, even…”

“F-For me…?!” Dany squeaked. “Y-You don’t have to-!”

“Hush, darling little one,” Lia soothed. “For you, we will do all we can. Isn’t that right, girls?”

The others nodded, each firm, each determined, as if Lia had placed the weight of the world on their shoulders and they were more than ready to bear it for Dany’s sake. Dany felt the tears in her eyes threaten to return. She didn’t know she could feel so moved. And as Mora had said, she dearly wanted to hope.

“Matron Lia?” Juno asked, her voice dropping even lower until Dany had to strain to hear it. “What about… What about Magister Illyrio’s ‘gift’…?”

The sudden secrecy was tantalizing, and Dany was so very curious. Lia looked at her and must have seen that.

“She does need it more than the magister or her brother…” Lia mused aloud before turning back to Juno, “If the opportunity comes and we must move quickly, can you…?”

Juno hesitated for a bare moment, glancing at Dany. Something must’ve passed between them, but Dany didn’t know what. She was just curious, yearning to know more. Juno seemed to take that curiosity as motivation.

Suddenly full of determination and commitment, Juno nodded, “I believe I can, Matron Lia-… NO, I know I can. I won’t let the Princess down. She’ll have her rightful gift, no matter what.”

“What-…?” Dany was still practically burning to know more, but it didn’t seem like her questions would be answered now.

Instead, Lia stood her up — dressed and ready to face her personal battlefield —, placed fortifying hands on her shoulders, and left her with one last piece of advice.

“Be alert, Princess. Be ready. It only takes a single moment, a single chance worth seizing, for everything to change for the better.”

IIIII

The arriving Khal was a monstrous man to Dany’s eyes. Not just a monster of a man, a monstrous man… The difference was subtle… but perhaps it had something to do with the hooves where his feet should’ve been.

Dany could hardly believe her eyes, even after Lia told her of so much magic returning and reawakening in the world. Khal Drogo was no mere man. He was a man. He was a stallion. He was both, some terrible amalgamation. He was a twisted champion of the Dothraki horse gods, with savagery in his veins, strength pouring off him, and a supreme hold over his people, by the look of things.

The Magister intended her to marry him? That…? And her brother had agreed, at least initially? The thought made Dany shudder and shake. They would throw her to the horses, just to further their own goals and ambitions. They would sell her to a monster without a single thought to the consequences she alone would bear.

Even if Viserys had seemingly changed his mind now, it didn’t make Dany feel better. Not at all. For it wasn’t love or morals that made her brother reconsider. It was that twisted flame that now answered his call. Only newfound power made him willing and able to alter his plans; newfound power that made him a monster equal to the Khal.

If her princely brother had his way, Dany knew her situation wouldn’t improve. It would just be sticking with the devil she knew. Perhaps didn’t know, not anymore… Dany couldn’t say she understood the Viserys who could call flames at will. After a life lived as the Beggar King, how could she trust her brother’s change of heart, only when personal power came calling for him?

Unfortunately, Dany was trapped. Hosted by a monstrous magister, controlled by a monstrous brother, and lusted after by a monstrous horse lord. No direction she turned to would grant her the agency to resist the plans those three powerful men had set in motion for her. She was a young girl, without an iota of control over her life, over her fate, while the controlling men around her all expected to profit from her in their own selfish ways.

The pressing reality almost made Dany wither within. She held back her need to flich, however, away from her brother and Magister Illyrio and the Stallion Khal. She knew, as always, that showing weakness would only make things worse for her.

As the Stallion Khal and his Dothraki approached, Dany’s eyes naturally sought out her kind servants. Lia was there, all but blending into the background for everyone but Dany. None would lower themselves to notice the matron, the first mother figure Dany had ever found. The expression on Lia’s face was stony and carefully controlled, but she spared her princess a small nod. That tiny show of camaraderie, of care, of love helped.

Dany took a fortifying breath as she focused her eyes back forward. Each of the Dothraki’s steeds was a beast in its own right. Taller than her at the shoulder and muscled like forces of nature. Their riders were the same, and worse. Monsters of men, to match their monstrous Khal.

“May I present, Khal Drogo and his bloodriders, Your Grace!” Illyrio said with a sort of simpering bravado that set Dany’s teeth on edge.

He only addressed Viserys as he spoke, not even glancing Dany’s way. To him, to all of the men there, she was a pure commodity. Not a guest, not a sister, not even a bride, not truly. She was meant to be controlled, to be owned, to be bred, not to protest or rebel or live.

Not even to Viserys’s changed mindset and new plans was she seen as anything more. The only real difference was that if Viserys had his way, she would be his, not Khal Drogo’s or Magister Illyrio’s.

Both outcomes were terrifying prospects to Dany’s meek mind. Once, perhaps, she would’ve preferred her brother’s way of doing things. Back when she still thought he truly loved her and truly saw her. Any truth in that had rotted with the life they’d lived, though. Now, she knew she would be his Targaryen bride, his pure womb to breed to his heart’s content, his queen while truly being nothing of the sort.

Khal Drogo rode closer, and Dany only grew more wary and horrified by the sight of him. He cut a towering figure and was as thick with powerful muscles as his steed was. It almost looked unnatural, the sheer physical prowess on display. No man should grow so statuesque, so savage. He would crush Dany in his palm with the simplest closing of his hand.

They greeted him at the gates of Illyrio’s manse with a reception worthy of any lord. The Dothraki, however, ignored all of the trappings of society laid out for them. They didn’t even dismount their beastly horses.

Viserys greeted them with eyes full of judgment and disdain bordering on outright disgust. He sneered as if trying to give offense. And while the Khal’s bloodriders bristled, Drogo himself ignored the Beggar King.

Illyrio threw his arms wide open and spun up a speech in a language Dany didn’t speak. The tongue of the Dothraki, almost certainly. Dany imagined it could be summed up with a single, enthusiastic ‘Welcome!’ in Westerosi Common.

Drogo reined his horse in with a dismissive grunt, ignoring the magister just as he ignored Viserys. Instead, he focused on Dany and Dany alone. Savage, roaming eyes laid her bare in the most unpleasant way. They cut through her silks to stare at her figure beneath. They weighed her in what felt like mind, body, and soul.

Dany dared to meet his eyes for only a moment. Then, she stared past him, over his shoulder, refusing to acknowledge him any more than that. It was all she could do. She was quaking inside, but stopped the terror before it could reach her skin and show.

“As you can see,” Viserys sneered. “She is a prize fit for a king. You would be luckier than any savage before you to claim such pure Valyrian stock. You should be thanking me for this mere opportunity.”

“The Khal does not speak Westerosi Common, Your Grace, or Bastard Valyrian, for that matter,” Illyrio informed him.

Viserys scoffed harshly, “And you think he is worthy of my sister?! Flames take you, man!”

“He brings the hordes of the Dothraki to your side, my Prince,” Illyrio reminded. “Would you ignore such a boon to your cause of reclaiming your rightful throne?”

“Yes!” Viserys snapped back. “I think I would!”

Illyrio blinked and sputtered, actually taken off guard by the vehement disagreement, “Y-Your Grace-! I-! Surely, you are not reconsidering now-?!”

“What is a King without his queen?!” Viserys snarled. “What is a Targaryen without his bride of blood?! A false one! A weak one! A cuckolded fool who would give his own sister to savages! NO!”

Now, Drogo was turning his attention to the two of them. Whether he actually understood them or not, Dany didn’t know. But he couldn’t miss the new hostility. He seemed intrigued by it, intently watching the way his would-be hosts argued.

“I would not call you false or weak or a cuckolded fool, my Prince!” Illyrio hurriedly reassured. He was clearly grasping, though, trying to wrangle a quickly spiraling situation. “You must-! Ah! Princess! Please, soothe your brother!”

Desperately, Illyrio turned to Dany to salvage what he could. And pointedly, Dany said nothing to either him or Viserys. She took her stand in the only way she could. Illyrio wanted help in his depraved and callous scheme — the scheme centered around selling her — but he would find only silence from Dany. Viserys seemed to take that silence as approval for his ‘plan’, whatever it was.

With a smug sneer, Viserys laughed, “I should kill you, take your riches, and be done with it. I should kill them, take their savage riders, and be better off! So long as I live, none shall lay a hand on my sister but I!”

Illyrio was visibly floundering, his own plans falling apart. Viserys moved to push forward his plan, to press his advantage of surprise and rage. His momentum, however, was cut off by an unlikely voice that joined the devolving situation.

“Prove. It.” The Khal had spoken, mangling Bastard Valyrian with a harsh, guttural tongue.

Viserys blinked for a mere moment before laughing loudly and falsely, right in Drogo’s face, “It speaks! It seems miracles are possible this day, Magister! Tell me, horsefucker, can you truly understand me, or are you just a savage savagely mimicking civil conversation?”

Dany was beginning to suspect that the Dothraki (Drogo and his bloodriders, at least) could understand Bastard Valyrian perfectly well. The bloodriders quite literally reared their horses in rage at the open insult. Drogo’s eyes narrowed dangerously, but he didn’t fully rise to the bait.

Instead, he just repeated himself, “Prove. It.”

“And if I don’t feel like lowering myself to such savagery, horsefucker?” Viserys taunted.

Drogo’s answering growl was a song of beasts, a hair-raising noise that shied nothing away from stark, primal reality, “Then. Little King dies. Screaming. Fat man dies. Crying. City burns. And I take my bride from blood and ashes.”

The Khal hadn’t just spoken, he’d challenged, and it was clear the impetus of the situation was now on Viserys, lest the Dothraki dispense with decency and take everything by force anyway.

The tension in the air — between Viserys on one side, with Illyrio starting to show signs of self-preservation, and Drogo backed up by his bloodriders on the other — was thick enough to cut. But despite Dany being the prize up for the taking, she found herself ignored. Shoved off to the side by aggressive, hostile men.

It didn’t do her much good when she was frozen, though, stuck standing there as stiff as any statue. Then, unnoticed by the feuding men who sought to take her for themselves, Lia moved up from the background. Gentle hands touched Dany’s shoulders, and she just about collapsed in relief.

Slowly and subtly, Lia began edging her away from the tension. Was… Was this the moment the matron had warned her to be ready for, the single seized opportunity for escape…? Looking around, Dany didn’t see her other kind servants. No Mora, no Ophil, and no Juno.

For a moment, she worried. Then, Lia put those worries to rest with a whisper, “They have their own tasks here, Princess. Whatever happens, they know where to reunite with us. Trust them, and concern yourself only with the here and now. We will have only one chance.”

Dany nodded, setting her lips in a firm line. She still worried, of course. How could she not worry about her new sisters? But Lia was right. She needed to focus, for if they failed, she would be chained to either a savage horse lord or a possessive Beggar King.

In the center of it all, Viserys spat, “Fine! You wish to fight, to die at the hands of a dragon?! I’ll gladly grant your wish, savage!”

Drogo drew a curved, scything sword and reared his steed onto two legs. They towered over Viserys, hooves preparing to thunder down upon him. The most primal natures of man were invoked. The fat magister froze, quaking where he stood until his knees gave out on him. Understandably looking to give flight from the coming violence, Lia began to usher Dany away with more urgency. Meanwhile, Drogo and Viserys both chose to fight.

Hooves descended on paved stone with twin thunderclaps. Savage strength, more beast than man, was pumped into a raised sword and resounding roar. But as Drogo and his steed charged forth, reality was lit aflame.

A maddened cackle. A chopped and jarring dragon’s roar. Dany couldn’t tell the difference. The sound from her brother’s mouth was both and neither, shattering the scene with a fiery shout.

Those twisted, twisted flames he could now call upon surged forth from his open maw, his hands, his every pore and orifice. They were a strange, impossible dragonfire, the first seen in the world since the Dance of Dragons. They clung to everything they touched like liquid lava and consumed it all in instants, fuel for freakish fire.

The horse lord and his steed had no chance to fight back. Even the most primal nature fears a wildfire. Viserys spat his dragonfire, and the powerful Stallion Khal ceased to be. His bloodriders followed in seconds, their screams cut off with terrible finality.

Viserys let loose with every flicker of flame he could muster. It wasn’t a discriminating burn. Magister Illyrio followed, his prodigious fat quite literally popping as his frame was charred black.

Out and out, the wave of dragonfire spread without pause or control. It melted stone, flared flora out of existence, and continued its unstoppable charge. Lia and Dany ran. Dany spared only a single glance back. Through the spreading dragonfire, she saw Viserys still standing tall, relishing his violent victory and completely unharmed by the destructive conflagration all around him.

His cackles and the cracking of his flames followed Dany, haunting her like a ghost, as Lia frantically pulled her along. Somehow, Dany felt nothing as her brother gave himself over to the madness in their Fire and Blood. She felt nothing at the ashing of the Dothraki. She felt nothing at the gruesome, fat-boiling death of their host.

She felt… nothing…? Not even the rush of escape…? Not even fear, as dragonfire continued to hound their flight from the scene…? How… How strange…

Lia led her down a side path through Illyrio’s garden and out past the boundaries of his estate. There, they met Mora, Ophil, and Juno. The older two of Dany’s kind, kind servants were carrying hastily assembled supplies. The youngest was carrying an odd chest. All of them bore looks of utter horror as they watched the dragonfire spread unimpeded throughout the whole estate they escaped.

It didn’t wane at all. If anything, the still spreading dragonfire seemed to grow hungrier. There was no control, no prevention. Just dragonfire. Everything burned.

Still, Dany felt… nothing… She didn’t even focus on the dragonfire behind them, not really. The odd chest in Juno’s hands had her attention. ‘Illyrio’s gift,’ She’d called it…? What-…?

Idly, Dany took the chest. Juno was still too horrified by the dragonfire to stop her. When Dany opened it to peek inside, her heart, her mind, her soul, and the world all around her stopped in place.

Three examples of beautiful scales stared back at her from within the chest. One of cream and gold, one of emerald green, and one of deep, deep black. Eggs. Dragon eggs…

They called to her, like nothing else she’d ever experienced. They completed her the moment she set eyes on them. A hole in her soul that she didn’t even know was there filled with a flood. And in that flood… a heartbeat, two, three… A resonance of fate.

In that frozen instant, Dany knew she was looking at her future. Her children. Her dragons. Her birthright, not just as a Targaryen, but as Daenerys Targaryen. They were hers in a way nothing else ever had been.

As the world seemed to resume motion around her, Dany was struck by the opposite of the empty nothingness she’d been feeling. Nausea and horror at the deaths she’d just witnessed and the spreading dragonfire behind her mixed with awe, wonder, and relief that her children were now in her arms.

It was a disorienting rush of emotion, but Dany pushed through. Moving automatically, she fashioned some of the extra silks she was wearing into a makeshift basket and hurried to transfer her children into it. In seconds, they were secured against the warmth of her body, and Dany turned to her kind servants.

“We must go!” She said in a rush. “Viserys will not stop! His madness, his dragonfire, will burn everything. Pentos is as good as lost! We must escape while we can!”

“A-As you say, Princess,” Even Lia was shaken by the spreading dragonfire, by the oncoming fiery death, by Viserys, but she seemed to take strength from Dany’s direction.

Together, Dany and her kind servants did the only thing they reasonably could. Again, they ran, now shouting warnings to all they passed. Behind them, Viserys burned. And in his madness, he cared not what burned with him.

IIIII

— Neville —

Pentos was burning. The whole city. Not a stone or brick or beam of wood was spared. The world was alight, ablaze, and the screams in the chaos were horrible.

So much smoke choked the air. So much heat scalded the skin and licked at every nerve. So much pain, so much terror, so much fire. Pentos burned…

How had it come to this…? Neville didn’t even know. It wasn’t anything they’d done. No, it was something else, some atrocity either spontaneous or long in the making. The Burning of Pentos was unconnected to their crusade as far as he could tell. And they’d been too focused to notice it until it was much too late.

Their work in Pentos had been effective. They’d taken a day to scope out the city and its internal situation, quickly deciding that the best course of action was to work from the top down in their crusade for freedom.

The Magisters of Pentos controlled the city with grips of gold and iron. Everything within Pentos’s vaunted walls came back to them in some way or another. The Magisters owned the places of work, the land itself, and more often the not, the people who needed both.

Their methods of control were many and varied. Some claimed debt, some claimed the means of production, and some simply claimed everything beneath them with sheer force. In the end, it was all the same. As a whole, the city of Pentos was enslaved to its Magisters. It was a system of plutocratic oligarchy in the most oppressive sense. The Magisters controlled all of the money in the city, controlled all of the power in all of its forms, and thus, they controlled everything else.

In Pentos, it was the Magisters, or nothing. As far as they were concerned, they were all that mattered. They went to great lengths to ensure that. Everyone else, everyone beneath them, was merely fodder and chaff for their personal profit.

They conscienced no challengers to their (quite literally) cutthroat collective stranglehold. There could be no social mobility in the world they’d built. No productive and profitable middle class. No advocates, no rising stars, and no outsiders. 

When it came to their positions as the pillars of Pentoshi society, there was unity between oppressors. They struggled against each other in their insulated game at the top levels of the city. But if someone else tried to interfere, they’d all strike the dangerous outsider down in their own ways.

Considering that, Neville decided an all-out blitz was the best way of toppling their oppressive reign over Pentos. The Magisters wouldn’t even get the chance to realize something was going so, so wrong in their worlds.

The very night that the New Argo docked in Pentos, Neville and Susan led the Hogwarts contingent of the crusade to do Professor Sproud proud. They hit a magister’s estate and left nothing standing. They robbed one of the richest men in the city blind. They took his wealth, his ‘servants’, and his very property right out from under him.

Much of that stolen wealth was given to the ‘servants’ they freed. The rest, the more material things, were used to furnish the New Argo. Masterwork furniture, silks and tapestries, spices and treasures now lined the rooms of their ship. As for the actual magister…? Well, Tracy used Legilmancy to casually obliterate his mind with frankly terrifying ease, and no one felt all that bad for the now babbling ‘servant’ holder.

The rest of the crusade had gotten in on the magister-ruining fun, too. Inigo led his bravos to target magisters in the street, calling them out for ‘righteous’ duels and not taking no for an answer. Furthermore, Hawk slipped away to do what he did best that first night.

It was dirty work. But none of them could afford to shy away from death. The Magisters headed a bloody and oppressive system, and so long as they lived, change couldn’t come to Pentos. So the crusade began methodically removing them from the equation and either seizing or redistributing their resources to wipe the slate clean.

There was no pussy-footing around the issue. No subtlety when the most guilty were standing so tall and clear-cut. The top-down foundation of Pentos needed to be shattered. But their methods weren’t purely destructive.

In the light of day, Hannah led them to help the people of Pentos, the oppressed majority. They bought out debt, healed the desperate and fed the destitute, offered ‘servants’ a way out, and quickly organized makeshift charities for immediate relief. Those productive paths to change helped soothe the dirty work they had to do in the night.

Now, though, mere days into their work in Pentos, all of those efforts were being rendered irrelevant. Worthless. They were all going up in smoke. Everything. Because Pentos burned.

A storied city was turning to ash before their eyes. Marble pillars melted. Grand, gilded statues seemed to scream as they were overtaken by wicked flames. Homes and livelihoods and whole estates burned and burned and burned until nothing remained. Impossible flames, magical flames, consumed everything in sight. Nothing escaped that cruel fate.

It was a great and terrible pyre to make any fire god proud. But Neville didn’t think the followers of R’hllor were to blame. Those he’d seen in the chaos were varied in their reactions. Some were just as terrified as everyone else. Others seemed to be seized by some divine revelation, gladly throwing themselves into the impossible flames while praising their Lord of Light. None of them controlled the blaze, though.

Everything had caught and spread quickly, too quickly. By Hogwarts’s reckoning, the flames almost seemed like Fiendfire. Imaginary demons roared in the leaping fire, and each consumed soul was terribly immortalized, a ghastly face in every flicker. The fire didn’t just crack and pop as it burned; it seemed to cackle, to laugh maniacally, unstoppably.

The panic was immense and visceral. The people of Pentos ran to and fro. They tried to fight the fire at first. It only grew and spread. They tried to salvage what they could of their lives and their city’s riches. It didn’t discriminate, burning all comers — rich and poor, desperate and opportunist — equally. They rushed to escape as all was lost. The terrible fire pursued with a mind of its own, a hunger that couldn’t be sated as it left sheer nothingness in its wake.

It seemed to come out of nowhere. A spark turned inferno in bare, panicked moments, a sudden wildfire catching on the tinder of a drought-stricken forest, a proliferating chaos that didn’t need to be fanned or fed to continue its unstoppable rush. The light of midday gained a second sun when one looked straight into the heart of the flames.

Hogwarts rallied quickly, of course; questions pushed to the backs of their minds. There was no time to theorize or wonder. The impossible flames called for immediate action. But where they tried to help, tried to push back and quell the flames, the fire only grew more fierce. It resisted all of their efforts, only flaring higher and higher as it burned man and material alike.

Neville threw a flood of pure, instinctive magic onto the pyre, waves of ‘water’ to the flame. It seemed to go up in so much smoke and ‘steam’. Professor Flitwick tried for a more focused and structured resistance to the fire, wrangling it with willful spellwork. It snapped back like a beast, like a fledgling dragon, and nearly caught the diminutive professor in its counter-surge.

They could push it back for mere moments before the fire adapted and rushed forth once more. Anything more would need concentrated effort and time they didn’t currently have. Instead of futilely throwing themselves into the flames, they switched to helping the frantic evacuation of the city.

“The harbor, the harbor!” Susan called to all who would listen. “Get to the harbor!”

“Gods, this is a disaster…” Domeric muttered in utter horror.

Flitwick shoved a summoned horn into his hands, giving him direction to keep their Westerosi ally from floundering, “Here, blow it as loud as you can, young man. Do everything you can to get people’s attention in this chaos and direct them to the harbor, as Susan said.”

Domeric gave a shaky nod to the order, “I-… I can do that. Just make myself seen and heard? I’m good at that.”

“Tracy, Terry, Sue, Justin, Dean,” Neville snapped off names to get their attention. “Get down to the harbor and make sure the other ships don’t leave until they have to. Feel free to get intimidating if the captains just try to save their own hides. We need all the space we can get to evacuate. If you can, keep the flames at bay when they get there.”

“On it, boss,” Tracy nodded seriously. “We’ll keep them in line long enough to load up everyone we can.”

The five of them apparated out without much fanfare, and Neville turned to the witch and wizard he hadn’t included in that effort, “Katie, I need you up above, keeping an eye out for people we can save from the fire. If you can, get them to the New Argo. We’ll pack as many people on board as we can fit, and then some, if possible.

“Seamus, you have free rein to blow us up some firebreaks. I don’t know how much good it will do, but any time you can buy will be useful.”

It was telling of the severity of the situation that Seamus didn’t even smile at the prospect of blowing things up. He just nodded seriously and followed Neville’s orders.

“And you four?” Katie asked before she took off on her broom.

Neville glanced at the ones who remained — him, Susan, Hannah, and Flitwick, “… Hannah is likely our best healer right now. Love, I need you to get back to the ship and start preparing for the aftermath. Clear a landing zone when you get there, and keep it clear. The Professor, Susan, and I will be apparating in and bringing people side-along. It’s going to be back to back to back, and I don’t think we’ll be getting a break anytime soon…”

He trailed off, but Susan just nodded, “Neville has the most power, Professor Flitwick has the most finesse, and Auntie made sure I was damn good at combat appies. It won’t be easy, but we need to try.”

Katie nodded at them, “Good luck and good apparating.”

Hannah just sent Neville and Susan a meaningful look that said everything she needed to say, ‘Don’t. Die.’

As Katie took to the sky, Hannah twisted on the spot with a crack. Neville steadied his breathing, preparing for the marathon ahead of them. Susan took his hand and squeezed. He squeezed back.

Flitwick, meanwhile, was stretching his little limbs. It would’ve been comical if not for the chaos around them, the screams and shouts and cries and cackling fire.

“I dearly hope I’ve not gotten too old for this,” He said almost absently. “It’s been a good decade or so since I needed to pop around like this. Word of advice, my students, trust your magic more than your eyes. It’ll place you where you’re needed most in a trying situation like this one.”

Before they could think to reply, Flitwick set himself in a racer’s stance and twisted. He was off, and the world snapped back into place behind him. Mentally and physically fortifying themselves, Neville and Susan followed.

Neville didn’t try to direct the apparition. As Flitwick advised, he trusted his magic. It was instinct, and manifested will, and a not-so-subtle push and pull from something greater. Magic itself took him where he was needed most.

Neville’s first pop took him into the literal heat of things. A small child was stranded, surrounded by the wicked flames. Neville didn’t even think, scooping the boy into his arms and popping back out.

He landed on the New Argo’s deck, identified the place Hannah had set aside for ‘landings’, dropped off the boy, and popped back out just as quickly.

The second pop was outside the immediate flames. A panicked mob had gathered there. Without direction, they were more likely to hurt themselves or push someone into the fire than successfully get away.

Too many to side-along, Neville could only give them the direction they needed, “The harbor! The harbor! The ships will take you to safety!”

The direction helped, but there were still too many frightened people for an orderly evacuation. As most of the mob ran toward the harbor, a grandmother, mother, and daughter were shoved out of the way.

Neville was with them in moments, warning them, “This will be uncomfortable. Try not to panic.”

With a mighty wrench of his magic, he popped back to the New Argo with the three of them in tow. As they landed, Neville took just a moment to magically dry the little girl’s tears and stand the grandmother up straight. It was the most he could do before he was off again.

Twist. Crack. Twist. Crack. Twist. Crack. Neville set a punishing pace for himself. His magical reserves were screaming, but held steady enough for Neville to push through the intense exertion.

As he popped around, the fire spread and spread. Near the center, there was already just ash. But the fire continued to rage there as if it had all the fuel it needed; a flaming scar that spilled out over the city. At the edges, it hungered for more. Everything it consumed reinforced the blaze. It burned and burned, and only gathered more momentum. There would be no stopping it. All Neville could do was rescue as many souls as he could from the destruction.

Again and again, he returned to the literal heat of things. He popped in just in time to save a man from a falling, flaming beam of wood.

He snapped up a pair of children where they sat, watching the blaze consume their home in petrifying shock.

He cracked into a bedroom in the fire’s path, snatching up a mother frantically praying over her baby.

He sprang into existence in front of another fleeing mob, throwing pure magic at the overtaking flames long enough for them to get away.

Neville demanded more and more from his prodigious magic. It couldn’t fail him now. It wouldn’t. He pushed himself to twist one more time, and another, and another, never letting himself rest while there were souls to save.

He ran himself ragged. He fought on fumes. He mustered every ounce of magic he could, so long as it would get him where he was needed most.

‘Just… one… more…’ Neville insisted.

Twist. Crack. Another pop took him into the flames. They felt different here. Angry. Possessive. Terribly focused. Running on fumes as he was, Neville worried he was taking in more aspects of the magic in the air than he was used to. But it didn’t matter. Not if Magic took him where he was needed.

A group of women was trapped by the fire there. One older matron and four younger women. The woman surrounded the youngest of them, a slender beauty of silver-gold hair and wide violet eyes. She was carrying a bundle of something close to her body. Instinctively, Neville knew it was the most important thing in her world, just like the mothers and their babes that he’d been constantly saving.

The flames around them approached more slowly than was natural. They seemed to be biding their time. As Neville caught his breath, they parted. A figure stepped through them. A young man with a manic grin and similar features to the youngest girl. The flames danced across his form.

“Viserys!” The girl shouted. “How-! How could you do this?!”

“How~…?” The flaming man purred a sinister chuckle. “Oh, Dany, dear Dany, this is the truth of a dragon. This is power. This is our royal right-…!”

“Nope, no bloody monologuing on my bloody watch. We don't have nearly enough time for that,” Neville cut in, thrusting himself into the group of women to ensure they were all touching him.

Fury immediately erupted over Viserys’s face. Shock appeared similarly in the group of women. But before either side could react, Neville twisted. Crack.

The monologuing villain and his flames disappeared in a swirl. The world was replaced with the deck of the New Argo, now crowded except for the designated ‘landing’ zone.

Immediately, almost instinctively, Neville pushed for ‘Just… one… more…’. It never came. The need was gone. The call of Magic to where he was needed most had finally ceased. He’d done… all he could… Neville collapsed like a sack of bricks.

From the deck, he got to watch the group of women, the last ones he’d been able to save, reel and retch. Side-along apparition wasn’t pleasant at the best of times. Running on fumes as Neville was…? Yeah, he didn’t envy those he’d saved there. Hopefully, though, the rescue would be more appreciated than the temporary discomfort was hated.

Coming back to herself, the youngest girl — ‘Dany’ — had her legs give out beneath her. Still, she kept the bundle secure against her body. Secure, that is, until the bundle began to twitch and shudder on its own.

Dany looked down at it in shock. The bundle shook. Hurriedly, she unwrapped it to reveal a sight Neville wasn’t expecting. There was no baby within. Instead, there were three scaled eggs… And they were now stirring with life. Hatching…

The whole world seemed to fall silent, watching with bated breath. Magic itself was on the edge of its seat. Cracks formed on the eggs from within. Then, three tiny, toothy, pointed snouts poked through each shell. Shrill, triumphant cries filled the air. Chirps and clicks and babyish attempts at proper roars followed the birthing cries.

Slowly, the dragon hatchlings crawled free of their birth. They immediately began to climb all over their ‘mother’, who sat utterly still in shock. One almost fell. Her hands naturally reached out to catch it. That seemed to break the spell. In an instant, a wide, life-changing smile was blooming across her face.

The matron with her named the scene in an awed murmur that carried almost physical weight, “Daenerys, Mother of Dragons…”

Still practically glued to the deck in his exhaustion, Neville couldn’t help but laugh before his exhaustion fully claimed him, “Heh, Hagrid’s going to be bloody ecstatic.”

IIIII

[AN: And that’s that for now. I’ve been waiting to get to the Burning of Pentos for ages now. It’ll certainly have far-reaching consequences. If Ginny’s death changed the story for Hogwarts, this will do the same for the rest of Planetos. A whole Free City is just gone. And it was done by an actually powerful Viserys Targaryen. He won’t be shy about making that known or continuing his reign of terror as he seizes support to reclaim ‘his throne’. In canon, Viserys is kind of a joke. But give him dragonfire/magical napalm and fire immunity and the madness of all his ancestors who thought they could literally become dragons…? Yeah, that should be fun lol.

It’s a plot for the future, though. Right now, I want to write SpacePolitik (and space conquest, space warfare, space liberation, all of that). So, KYBERPUNK is up next. The story should be expanding out of Night City/Nar Shaddaa pretty quickly to the rest of the Star Wars galaxy. The Clone Wars should also be starting up there soon. Lots of fun to be had in the Cyberpunk Galaxy Far, Far Away. :]

IIIII

Bonus Pics (sauce below)