Chapter Text
The air in Ashford Meadow was usually vibrant with the scent of roasted meat, wine, and the sweat of a thousand horses, a festive cacophony of music and armored men boasting of their prowess. But today, the sky seemed to bruise prematurely, turning a sickly, swirling grey as if the gods themselves were holding their breath.
The chaos had been a masterstroke of misdirection. First, a series of staged explosions—barrels of volatile alchemical fire—shattered the stillness of the practice yard with a thunderous, concussive boom that sent birds fleeing from the trees. As knights scrambled for their weapons and horses shied in terror, rearing and kicking through the wooden rails, the sellsword company, known as the “Sons of the Cinder,” executed their secondary maneuver. They didn't strike the main camp; they ignited a diversionary fire in the merchant tents, drawing the royal guard into a frantic, smoke-choked rescue.
In that swirling, ash-heavy blindness, the Targaryen party was cut off.
Prince Maekar had fought with the ferocity of the mace he favored, his weapon shearing through a mercenary’s gorget in a spray of hot crimson, but they were swarmed. Three dozen men-at-arms, clad in mismatched brigandine and rusted chainmail, converged on them.
“Baelor, back to the castle!” Maekar roared, his voice cracking with the exertion of parrying spears from the sides, his brow furrowed in a mask of battle-hardened concentration.
Baelor Breakspear, ever the tactician, lunged forward to shield his son and nephews, his face pale but resolute, but he was struck by a weighted net cast from the shadows. He fell hard into the trampled mud, grunting as the heavy mesh pinned his arms. Aerion had shrieked, a high, piercing sound of wounded pride that echoed off the trees, before a mercenary’s gauntleted fist caught him across the jaw, with a sickening crack, silencing his protests and sending him sprawling into the dirt. Prince Valarr, Daeron, princess Kiera and young Aegon were tackled by multiple assailants, their expensive silks torn by coarse hands, their noble blood smeared with the dark, gritty grime of the meadow as they were forced to their knees.
They were herded like cattle, prodded by the jagged, rusted spear-tips of the mercenaries, and dragged away from the main road and into the suffocating gloom of an ancient, ruined sept on the edge of the woods. The stone walls were slick with moss and the stench of decay, and the roof had long since surrendered to the suffocating embrace of ivy. The only light filtered through a cracked stained-glass window high above, casting jagged, colored shards of light—reds, deep blues, and murky golds—that danced upon the filthy floorboards.
The princes were chained to the heavy, crumbling pillars of the nave, their wrists chafed by iron manacles. The silence here was absolute, broken only by the rhythmic, hollow dripping of water from the ceiling and the heavy, ragged breathing of the captive dragons.
“They want gold,” Baelor whispered, his voice steady despite the iron shackle biting into his wrist as he tried to shift into a more comfortable position. He looked at his brother, his eyes scanning the gloom. “They are not here for blood. If they wanted us dead, we would have fallen in the meadow.”
“They want to break us,” Maekar hissed, his violet eyes scanning the shadowed corners of the ruin like a caged dragon. He tested his chains, the metal clinking harshly. “They want the Iron Throne to grovel. Look at the captain—he treats us like bait.”
The captain of the Sons of the Cinder, a Tyroshi with a beard dyed in garish, mocking stripes of blue and yellow, stepped into the light, his boots crunching on broken glass. He leaned heavily on a notched greatsword that had seen more tavern brawls than battlefields. “A champion,” he grunted, his voice oily. “One man against my best. Win, and the 'Dragons' fly free. Lose, and the ransom goes up by a million dragons. Or, perhaps, we start taking fingers. And he must fight for every last one of you,” he finished with a rasping, ugly laugh.
Aerion spat a glob of blood onto the floor, his purple eyes burning with defiance even as his lip swelled. "You are dead men. The King will burn you to ash for this."
The captain laughed, a dry, rasping sound. “Your grandfather is miles away, little prince, and your guards are busy putting out fires of our making. Who will stand for you? Who would dare face my men?”
“I will,” Baelor said suddenly, straining against his chains until his arms bulged. “I am the Prince of Dragonstone, the heir to the throne. If a champion is required, I should be the one to—”
“No,” Maekar interrupted, his jaw tight, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. “I am stronger. If anyone fights, it is me.”
Before the captain could mock them further, the atmosphere in the ruin changed. The air began to hum—a low, vibrating frequency that made the very stones tremble and the dust motes freeze in mid-air. The shadows on the wall seemed to detach themselves, coalescing into a singular, elongated form.
The heavy oaken doors of the ruined sept groaned and then exploded inward—not from force, but as if the wood had simply withered away into centuries of dust in a single heartbeat.
Standing in the threshold was a figure that defied the dimness of the afternoon. He was clad in armor of white enamel that seemed to absorb the twilight and amplify it, glowing with a soft, ethereal luminescence that chased the shadows from the room. He was a mountain of a man, nearly seven feet tall, his white cloak pinned by a golden clasp of the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard that shimmered with unnatural intensity. He moved not like a man walking, but like a tide coming in, purposeful and inevitable.
The mercenaries panicked. One, then two, leveled their crossbows, their fingers white-knuckled on the triggers, but the bolts seemed to lose their momentum mid-air, dropping harmlessly into the dirt as if they had struck an invisible wall of heavy, solidified time.
The giant did not draw his sword. He simply walked toward the pillars, his heavy boots striking the flagstones with the resonance of a funeral bell.
“Who goes there?” the Tyroshi captain demanded, his voice trembling as he backed away, his hand shaking so violently on the hilt of his sword that it rattled against his scabbard.
The giant stopped. He did not look at the mercenaries. He looked at the princes—at Baelor, Maekar, and the boys. A champion had arrived, and the world felt as though it had shifted on its axis.