Rewriting Targaryen History

Chapter 13: Chapter 13: The Dragon’s Passenger

Daemon Targaryen did not ask.

That was the first mistake I made in understanding him. I had believed, foolishly, that if the Rogue Prince wished something of me, he would present it as an offer, a command, or perhaps a threat wrapped in courtesy. I thought there would be room to answer, even if the answer was only the illusion of choice.

There was no offer. There was no invitation. There was only Daemon.

The morning after his crowning, Bloodstone woke beneath a hard grey sky. The sea was restless, beating itself against the rocks as if offended by the new king who had claimed them. Men moved through camp with the strange looseness that follows victory, not peaceful, not relaxed, but freed from the constant expectation of sudden death. House Velaryon’s banners snapped in the wind. Dread Legion soldiers cleaned weapons, mended armour, counted supplies, and spoke of home, pay, and what contracts might come next.

For the first time since crossing the Narrow Sea, I had begun to think beyond the Stepstones.

That alone should have warned me.

Vaeron and I stood near the company’s command area, reviewing the final casualty lists and payment calculations with Dick. Fifteen dead over the last three months. One hundred and five at Bloodstone. Twenty on the voyage. Every number had a name attached, and Vaeron had insisted that the shares owed to the dead be calculated before anything else. I agreed. Whatever victories I had won, I would not let the company become the kind of force that spent men and forgot them once the songs began.

Jasper was arguing with Landrey over horses. Emeric was complaining about bowstrings again. Rollis sat nearby sharpening a knife with the calm patience of a man who had survived enough wars to distrust any ending that looked too clean.

It almost felt ordinary. Then Caraxes screamed.

The sound cut across the camp as red-hot iron dragged over bone. Men froze. Horses panicked. Conversation died in an instant. Even those who had grown used to dragons during the campaign looked up with wary respect as the Blood Wyrm descended from the ridge above camp.

Caraxes landed with ugly grace, long neck curling, red wings folding like torn banners against his sides. He was not beautiful in the way Seasmoke was beautiful. Seasmoke had an elegance to him, pale and swift, almost silver when the sun struck his scales. Caraxes looked wrong by comparison, too long, too lean, too serpentine, as if some artist had stretched a dragon into a weapon and left every graceful part sharpened into menace.

Heat rolled from him even at a distance.

Daemon stood beside the dragon, one hand resting on the saddle straps as if he were leaning against a favourite horse rather than a monster capable of turning ships into ash. He wore dark riding leathers and armour marked with the red of his house. A crown sat nowhere on his head, but somehow that only made him look more dangerous. Kings with crowns could be mocked. Daemon without one looked like a man who had decided symbols were for everyone else.

His eyes found me across the camp.

I felt Vaeron stiffen before I did. "No," he said quietly.

I did not answer.

Daemon began walking toward us, and the camp seemed to part before him without being ordered. Velaryon soldiers stepped aside. Dread Legion men watched carefully, uncertain whether to salute, bow, or simply remain still. Caraxes followed slowly behind him, claws digging into the earth, long neck swaying as his eyes moved over the gathered men with unsettling intelligence.

Daemon stopped a few paces from me. "Captain Galeris," he said.

"My prince," I replied.

"King," one of his men corrected from behind him.

Daemon did not look away from me. "Prince will do." That unsettled me more than correction would have.

Vaeron stepped half a pace closer to my side. "Your Grace," he said carefully.

Daemon’s gaze flicked to him for only a moment, then returned to me. "I am returning to King’s Landing."

"I had heard as much."

"Good. Then you can spare me the trouble of explaining."

Something cold moved through my stomach. Daemon smiled. "You are coming with me."

The words landed heavily enough that for a moment I almost believed I had misheard him. Around us, several nearby men went still. Vaeron’s expression hardened instantly, all trace of tiredness vanishing beneath sharp alarm.

I kept my voice even. "With you?"

"To King’s Landing," Daemon said, as though speaking to a slow child. "The capital. Seat of my brother. Smells of shit, ambition, and fear. You will recognise it quickly."

"I have men to command."

"You have a brother," Daemon said. "A clever one, if the ledgers are any indication. He can keep your sellswords from eating each other for a few days."

Vaeron’s jaw tightened. "The Dread Legion is under my brother’s command."

"And your brother is under mine at present."

The silence that followed was dangerous.

Technically, he was wrong. The contract had been made with House Velaryon, not with Daemon personally. The Dread Legion was not sworn to him, and I was no subject of his newly claimed kingdom except in the loosest, most insulting sense. I could have said all of that. I could have recited every term Vaeron had written, every clause Corlys had agreed to, every boundary between paid service and feudal obedience.

And every man present would have watched me tell Daemon Targaryen no while Caraxes breathed behind him. That was the trap. It was not subtle. Daemon did not need subtlety when he had a dragon.

I looked past him to the Blood Wyrm. Caraxes’s head had lowered slightly, his yellow eyes fixed on the gathering as if deciding which of us would scream best if burned. Heat shimmered in the air around his jaws.

My mouth went dry. Daemon saw it. Of course he saw it.

His grin sharpened. "You walked alone into the dunes, killed the Crabfeeder, and raised his head over Bloodstone. Surely a short flight will not trouble you."

There were men watching. Too many men. Dread Legion soldiers, Velaryon officers, sailors, guards, camp servants, all of them waiting to see what the celebrated captain would do when the Rogue Prince decided to take him as part of his victory procession.

Refusing would make me look weak. Accepting would make me a trophy. Daemon knew that too.

Vaeron spoke before I could. "My prince, the company’s affairs are not settled. Payments, wounded, supplies, departure arrangements. My brother is needed here."

"Then he should be grateful he has you."

"He was not invited."

Daemon’s eyes moved to Vaeron fully this time. The temperature of the space seemed to change. "I do not remember asking your permission, boy."

Vaeron did not flinch, but I saw the danger tightening around us. Jasper had stopped arguing with Landrey. Dick’s hand had closed around his ledger as though it were a shield. Several Dread Legion men had begun watching more closely than was wise. One wrong word, one hand too close to a sword, and this could turn into something that ended with ashes.

I stepped in before Vaeron could answer. "Vaeron," I said quietly.

His eyes cut to me, furious. I held his gaze. "You will oversee the company in my absence."

"No." It was not loud, but the word carried more force than shouting. Daemon looked amused. I lowered my voice. "This is not the place."

"That is convenient," Vaeron said. "Because it never seems to be the place when someone decides your life belongs to them."

The words struck harder than I expected. Daemon laughed softly. "He has spirit."

"He has sense," I said.

"Then he will know not to test mine."

I turned back to Daemon. "How long will I be gone?"

"How long does a man need to see the capital?" Daemon asked. "A few days. Perhaps more, if my brother proves entertaining."

"You wish to present me at court."

"I wish to return to my brother after winning a war he did not help me win," Daemon said. "I wish him to see what was done in the Stepstones while his council counted coins and sent concern across the sea. I wish him to hear how the Crabfeeder died."

"And I am proof."

Daemon smiled again. "You are part of the story."

There it was, spoken plainly enough that pretending otherwise became impossible.

I was not being invited to King’s Landing. I was being taken. Not as a prisoner, exactly, and not as an honoured guest, though Daemon would likely call me both depending on which was more amusing in the moment.

I was evidence. A living ornament to place before Viserys and the court. The foreign Valyrian sellsword captain who had helped break Bloodstone. The man with silver hair, purple eyes, a Valyrian steel sword, and a reputation fresh enough to still smell of blood.

Daemon wished to show off his achievement. And he had decided I belonged among the spoils. I wanted to refuse. Gods, I wanted to refuse.

Not because I did not want to see King’s Landing. Some part of me, the old part, the boy from Dresden who had read these histories until they felt more real than his own life, wanted it desperately. The Red Keep. The Blackwater. The Dragonpit. The court of Viserys Targaryen. Alicent. Rhaenyra. Otto Hightower. Names that had once belonged to pages and screens now waited across the sea.

But wanting to go was not the same as wanting to be taken. And leaving my men behind felt like stepping away from the only ground beneath my feet.

Vaeron’s anger had not faded. "You cannot just leave."

"I know."

"Then do not."

I looked at him, and for a moment the camp disappeared. He was sixteen, too young to carry what had already been placed upon him, and yet he stood there ready to argue with a dragonrider because he thought I was being dragged into danger. He had buried men with me. He had watched me bleed. He had told me not to make him captain, and now Daemon was forcing me to do almost exactly that.

"I need you to command until I return," I said.

His expression twisted. "And if you do not return?"

"I will."

"You do not know that."

"No," I admitted. "But I know the company will survive if you lead it."

That did not comfort him. It only made him look angrier.

Daemon clapped a hand once, impatient. "Touching as this is, Caraxes grows bored."

Caraxes answered with a low rumble that vibrated through the ground. I turned to Jasper. "The men remain under Vaeron’s command while I am gone. You, Rollis, Dick, Emeric, and Landrey will support him."

Jasper looked from me to Daemon and back again. His scarred face held the kind of anger older soldiers knew how to bury. "As you say, captain."

Dick nodded stiffly. "The accounts will be settled."

"Make sure the dead are paid first."

"They will be."

Rollis rose slowly from his seat, knife still in hand. "Try not to anger every lord in the capital before we can negotiate our next contract."

"I will do my best."

"That is not reassuring."

"It was not meant to be."

A few men laughed uneasily. It helped, though not enough. Vaeron stepped close enough that only I could hear him. "Do not let him make you his."

The words chilled me. "I will not."

"He is not taking you because he likes you."

"I know."

"He is taking you because people will look at you and see his victory."

"I know."

Vaeron’s eyes searched mine. "Then remember whose banner you command."

I placed a hand on his shoulder. "Purple field. White sword. Crescent wreath."

His mouth tightened, but some of the anger gave way to grief. "Good."

For a moment, I thought he might embrace me. Instead, he did what Vaeron always did when emotion came too close to the surface. He turned it into duty. "I will keep the company intact," he said. "I will settle the accounts, oversee the wounded, and refuse any contract offered in your absence unless it is necessary for survival."

"Good."

"If you die, I will be furious."

"I will try to avoid that."

His eyes narrowed. "You keep saying that as if it is enough."

"It will have to be."

Daemon called from near Caraxes, "Captain."

The single word carried command. I released Vaeron’s shoulder and stepped away. Walking toward Caraxes was harder than walking into the dunes. That was humiliating, but true.

The Crabfeeder’s men had been human. Dangerous, yes, but human. They bled when cut. They died when World Breaker struck them. Caraxes was something else entirely. A living weapon from a vanished empire, all muscle, scale, heat, and ancient malice.

His head turned as I approached, and his eye followed me with such focus that every childhood fantasy I had ever entertained about dragons died a quick and sensible death.

He was magnificent. He was horrifying. He was too real.

Daemon stood beside the saddle straps, watching me enjoy none of this. "First time?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Try not to fall."

"That is your advice?"

"It is the important part."

I looked up at the saddle and the harness fixed along Caraxes’s back. It seemed absurdly high, absurdly exposed, and far too small for the amount of trust required. There was space behind Daemon, though calling it a seat felt generous. It was more a place where a man could cling and pray.

"I assume there are straps," I said.

Daemon’s grin returned. "There are."

"Enough for two?"

"If you have strong hands."

I stared at him.

He laughed and climbed first, moving with practised ease up the dragon’s side. Caraxes shifted beneath him but did not object. The dragon accepted Daemon as naturally as a sword accepted its wielder. That, more than anything, made the power gap between us impossible to ignore.

I had World Breaker. Daemon had this.

A blade, even Valyrian steel, was still a blade. It required reach, strength, skill, and the nearness of death. Caraxes required only command. With a word, Daemon could burn what I needed men, tactics, and blood to take. With wings, he could cross distances that would cost me weeks. With fire, he could erase armies from above.

I had won fame on Bloodstone. Daemon had allowed me to stand beneath the shadow of his kind of power.

I climbed. It was awkward, undignified, and deeply unpleasant. The scales were hot beneath my gloves, ridged and hard like armour grown from flesh. The smell of dragon filled my lungs: smoke, musk, heat, and something old that my mind had no proper name for.

When I reached the place behind Daemon and settled there, Caraxes shifted again, and my stomach dropped as if the ground had vanished already.

Daemon glanced back. "Hold to the straps." I did. "Not me."

"I was not planning to."

"Good. I would hate to think the Crabfeeder’s butcher needed comfort."

I refused to answer.

Below, Vaeron stood among the Dread Legion, his face pale and furious. The men watched in silence, and I realised suddenly how this looked to them. Their captain, taken onto the back of a dragon by a Targaryen prince, leaving the company behind in the Stepstones. Some would see honour. Some would see danger. Some would wonder whether Othorion Galeris was rising beyond them.

That thought frightened me almost as much as the dragon. I raised one hand to Vaeron. He did not return the gesture at first. Then, slowly, he placed a fist over his heart. The Dread Legion followed. Hundreds of fists struck breastplates, leather, and mail in a single heavy sound.

I wanted to say something. To promise I would return. To command them to stand firm. To tell them that I had not chosen this.

But Caraxes moved before I could. The dragon spread his wings. The world became wind.

Caraxes launched from the ground with such violence that my entire body slammed backwards against the straps. My stomach dropped. The camp fell away beneath us, tents and men shrinking with impossible speed.

I gripped the leather so tightly my hands ached, even through my gauntlets. Wind tore at my hair, my armour, my eyes. The sea opened below, vast and cold, and Bloodstone became a jagged wound in the water.

I did not scream. That was the only dignity I kept.

Daemon leaned slightly back, just enough for his voice to carry over the wind. "Still alive?"

"For now!"

"What was that?"

"For now!"

He laughed, and Caraxes climbed higher.

The air grew colder. The sea stretched endlessly beneath us, dark blue and silver beneath the clouded sky. Every dip of Caraxes’s wings sent terror knifing through me. Every shift of his long body reminded me that nothing but leather, strength, and Daemon’s whim kept me from falling into the Narrow Sea.

I had imagined dragonflight before. Of course I had.

Who would not, after reading of Targaryens and their beasts? In my old life, dragons had been wonder made flesh, symbols of lost magic, beautiful and terrible from the safety of a page. I had imagined the glory of it. The freedom. The view.

I had not imagined the fear.

The height was obscene. The wind clawed at me like hands. Caraxes’s muscles moved beneath me with living power, each beat of his wings a reminder that I sat upon something that had no reason to care whether I survived. The world below was too far away to belong to men anymore.

Daemon flew as if born to it.

He did not cling. He did not stiffen. He guided Caraxes with movements so slight I barely understood them, body and dragon working together in a way that felt almost intimate. He belonged here, in the sky, above armies, above laws, above men like me who could only hold on and endure.

The lesson was obvious. Perhaps that was why he had done it.

"You are quiet!" Daemon called.

"I am admiring the view!"

"Liar."

"I am trying not to die!"

That earned another laugh. Then Caraxes dropped.

Not far. Not enough to be dangerous to Daemon. But enough for my heart to launch itself into my throat as the dragon folded his wings slightly and plunged toward the sea. Wind roared past us. The water rushed upward. I locked my arms around the straps and forgot every language I knew except terror.

Caraxes levelled out so low that spray kissed my boots.

Daemon turned his head. "Still prefer the dunes?"

I could barely breathe. "The dunes did not move!"

"No," Daemon said. "But they tried to kill you."

"So does your dragon!"

"Caraxes has not tried to kill you."

The dragon gave a shrieking cry that suggested the matter remained open. Daemon smiled as though he had heard my thought. He was enjoying this.

Not because he wanted me dead. That would have been simpler. He was enjoying the reminder. The demonstration. The silent correction to whatever pride my victory on Bloodstone might have given me. I had slain the Crabfeeder, yes. Men had cheered my name, yes. Songs might even grow from it, if the world proved especially unkind.

But Daemon Targaryen could pluck me from my army, place me on a dragon, and carry me across the sea because he wished to show me to his brother. That was power. Not respect. Not command earned over years.

Power. The kind that did not need permission.

By the time King’s Landing appeared on the horizon, my hands had gone numb from gripping the straps.

At first, the city was only a smear against the coast, smoke rising above walls and roofs. Then the shape sharpened. The Blackwater glimmered beneath the afternoon light, crowded with ships.

The city sprawled around it, vast, filthy, alive, and far larger than the maps and memories had ever made it seem. Streets twisted like veins through districts packed with people. Sept towers rose above cramped roofs. The Dragonpit crowned Rhaenys’s Hill like the hollowed skull of some dead god.

And there, high above the city, stood the Red Keep.

My breath caught despite everything.

The fortress rose from Aegon’s High Hill in red stone and sharp angles, its towers catching the light, its walls looking down upon the capital as if judging everything beneath them. I had seen it in imagination a thousand times.

I had read of its halls, its secrets, its murders, its councils, its feasts, its betrayals. In that castle, futures would be born and destroyed. In that castle, Rhaenyra Targaryen’s fate would take shape. Alicent Hightower’s influence would deepen. Viserys would weaken. Otto would scheme. Children would grow into claimants, rivals, corpses.

The Dance was not here yet. But its shadow was.

Daemon guided Caraxes toward the city. People looked up. Of course they did.

A dragon over King’s Landing was no small thing, even in the age when dragons still lived in number. Caraxes shrieked as he descended, and the sound rolled over rooftops, markets, streets, and courtyards. Men pointed. Horses reared. Somewhere below, bells began to ring, whether in warning or announcement, I could not tell.

We landed near the Dragonpit first, hard enough that my teeth nearly cracked together. For several seconds, I did not move. My body had forgotten how.

Daemon unfastened himself with infuriating ease and climbed down. When he reached the ground, he looked back up at me.

"Coming, Captain?"

I forced my fingers open one at a time.

Climbing down was worse than climbing up because my legs had decided they no longer trusted me. I managed it without falling, though only just. The moment my boots touched solid ground, I understood why men kissed soil after long sea voyages.

I wanted to do the same. I did not.

Daemon watched me with bright amusement. "You kept your stomach. Better than some."

"My prince is kind to say so."

"I am not."

"No," I said. "You are not."

He laughed and started toward the waiting guards as if nothing unusual had happened.

I stood for one final moment beside Caraxes, feeling heat radiate from the dragon’s body, and looked toward the Red Keep rising above the city. I was far from my men, far from Vaeron, far from the Dread Legion’s banners and the rough certainty of camp. Here, I had no army at my back. No brother at my side. No familiar officers ready to turn my orders into action.

I had only World Breaker, my name, my armour and the attention of a prince who had decided I was useful.

Daemon paused ahead of me and glanced back. "Come, Othorion," he said. "Let us show my brother what we brought back from the Stepstones."

My stomach tightened. Not from the flight this time. From the knowledge that I had not arrived in King’s Landing as a guest.

I had arrived as part of Daemon Targaryen’s victory.