Chapter 10: A Whisper of Armies
Daemon returned to Dragonstone as a man haunted by a new ghost. It was not the ghost of his murdered nephew or his dead cousin, but the living ghost of the god-monster he had just bargained with. He strode into the Chamber of the Painted Table, the scent of sea salt and ozone clinging to him like a shroud, his violet eyes holding a new, deeper, and more dangerous light. Rhaenyra rushed to him, her face a mask of anxiety.
"Daemon! You are safe!" she breathed, her hands clutching his arm. "That light in the sky… we feared it was a trap. That Aemond and Vhagar had finally caught you alone."
Daemon looked at his wife, his queen, and for a fleeting moment, the enormity of his secret threatened to choke him. He had just conversed with a power that could unmake Vhagar as easily as a man might swat a fly. He offered a thin, reassuring smile that did not reach his eyes. "Aemond lacks the imagination for such a display. I went hunting for answers, my queen. The board is not as we thought. It is best we do not move our pieces blindly."
His cryptic answer did little to soothe the tense atmosphere of the Black Council, which convened moments after his return. Lord Corlys Velaryon, ever the pragmatist, was tired of waiting.
"The Greens are broken!" the Sea Snake declared, his fist striking the painted surface of Westeros, right over King's Landing. "Their armies are cinders, their coffers are empty, their king is a drunkard, and their queen is mad. My ships have a stranglehold on the Gullet. Now is the time to strike! Land our forces at Blackwater Bay. Put a knife to the Usurper's throat and end this madness!"
Several of the lesser lords voiced their assent, their appetites whetted by the sudden, inexplicable string of victories. Rhaenyra looked to Daemon, her expression seeking his counsel, his validation for a swift, final blow.
Daemon, however, remained impassive. He paced before the hearth, the firelight glinting off the ruby in Dark Sister's pommel. "And march our men into the same fog that swallowed Meleys? To be greeted by the same fire that melted Ser Criston's host?" he countered, his voice dangerously soft. "We did not win these victories, my lords. They were… given to us. We do not know the benefactor, nor their price."
"Price?" Lord Bartimos Celtigar scoffed, his face pale. "It is the gods' favour! They punish the kinslayers and the oathbreakers!"
"I have never known the gods to be so… efficient," Daemon said with a faint, chilling smile. "Nor so even-handed. We lost the Red Queen. They lost an army. We sit here debating while they mourn a murdered prince. There is a balance to these events that feels less like divine will and more like an accounting. I counsel patience. Let us see where this new power on the board places its next piece before we sacrifice one of our own."
His words, so uncharacteristically cautious, baffled the council. The Rogue Prince, the most impulsive and violent man in the Seven Kingdoms, was arguing for restraint? Corlys Velaryon stared at him, his dark eyes narrowed in suspicion. He sensed the shift in his son-in-law, the secret coiled behind his placid façade. But before he could press the matter, Rhaenyra sided with her husband. His counsel, however strange, was a comfort to her. They would wait. They would watch.
Daemon had bought his new 'ally' time. He had given the order. Now, all he could do was wait for the whisper of its success.
In the Red Keep, hope had a name: Ormund Hightower. It was a prayer on the lips of every courtier, a desperate mantra whispered in the halls. While the Crownlands were a smoldering ruin, Lord Ormund, cousin to the Dowager Queen Alicent, was gathering the might of the Reach at the town of Bitterbridge. Tens of thousands of men, the finest knights and archers in Westeros, were flocking to the Hightower banner. It was the Greens' last great hope, an army so vast it could sweep north and crush Rhaenyra's forces through sheer, unstoppable weight.
The Green Council chamber was a place of grim resolve. Alicent, her face etched with grief but her spine stiff with piety, had taken a more active role since her daughter's descent into madness.
"Lord Ormund writes that his host is near thirty thousand strong," she announced, her voice clear and steady. "Knights from Oldtown, from the Shield Islands, from across the Reach. He will be ready to march within the fortnight."
"He needs protection," Aemond insisted, his voice a low, guttural growl. He had not been the same since he'd seen the devastation at Rook's Rest. The rage was still there, but it was now underpinned by a cold, obsessive dread. "This… thing… struck down Cole's army. It could do the same to Ormund's. I must fly south. Vhagar will be their shield."
"And leave the capital defended by whom?" Otto Hightower countered, his face haggard. "The goldcloaks and a few household knights? What if this demon appears over the city? What if it was merely luring you away, Prince Aemond? You and Vhagar are the cornerstone of our defense. You are the reason it has not yet dared to strike at the city itself. You are the King's shield. You cannot leave his side."
"So I am to sit here, a chained dog, while our last army is offered up for slaughter?" Aemond seethed.
"You are to be a Prince of the Realm," Alicent said sharply, her authority cutting through her son's rage. "You will remain here. We will send riders to Lord Ormund, warn him to accelerate his march. His numbers are his strength. Not even a dragon, not even Balerion himself, could face thirty thousand men at once. We must have faith in the strength of our swords and the loyalty of our lords."
Her words sealed their fate. Aemond, bound by his duty and his grandsire's logic, remained in King's Landing, a caged lion, while the fat, juicy lamb was being prepared for sacrifice hundreds of miles to the south.
Krosis-Krif flew south at an altitude that rendered him invisible to the world, a mere distortion in the high, thin clouds. The pact with Daemon was a fascinating new variable in his calculations. The Rogue Prince was a perfect tool: intelligent enough to be useful, arrogant enough to believe he was in control, and ruthless enough to have no moral qualms about the work being done. Krosis-Krif felt the man's ambition like a beacon, a burning desire he could manipulate and feed. He was not just a parasite on the war anymore; he was a symbiote, bonded to one of its key players.
He found the Hightower host at Bitterbridge. It was, he had to admit, an impressive sight. A city of tents and pavilions sprawled across the fertile banks of the Mander. The banners of a hundred noble houses—the three-arched bridge of Tarly, the hunting horn of Peake, the oak tree of Oakheart—fluttered in the breeze around the central stone tower of House Hightower. The camp was alive with the sounds of men and horses, the ring of smiths' hammers, and the arrogant laughter of knights who believed themselves to be on the cusp of a glorious war. They were the flower of the Reach's chivalry, confident and proud.
Krosis-Krif watched them for a day, his colossal form hidden within a low-hanging bank of clouds over the hills to the east. He analyzed their sprawling, disorganized camp. Unlike Cole's disciplined force, this was a feudal host, a collection of dozens of smaller armies, full of pride and rivalry. It was strategically weak, but rich in life force. He felt a familiar, cold hunger stir within him. This was not just a contract. It was a feast.
He attacked at dawn. There was no fog this time. He wanted them to see.
He descended not as a silent wraith, but as a judgment. He simply dropped from the clouds, his immense form blotting out the rising sun, casting the entire encampment into a terrifying, premature twilight.
For a moment, the army of thirty thousand men was struck dumb, their upturned faces a sea of disbelief. They had expected dragons, but they had expected Sunfyre or Caraxes. They had not expected a living eclipse. They had not expected a god.
Lord Ormund Hightower was shouting orders from outside his command tent, but his voice was lost in the sudden, collective gasp of his entire army. He drew his sword, its silver chasing glinting in the sudden gloom. "To arms! Form ranks! Archers!"
It was useless. Krosis-Krif opened his jaws and the symphony began. The sub-sonic hum washed over them, a physical wave of terror that buckled knees and shattered courage. But this time, it was accompanied by his voice, a true voice, a telepathic roar projected into the minds of every living thing in the valley.
"NAAK… HIN… SIL." (EAT… YOUR… SOUL.)
The incomprehensible Dovahzul words, filled with an ancient power and a clear, malevolent intent, broke them completely. This was not a beast roaring. This was a thinking, speaking entity passing sentence upon them.
Then came the fire. It was not a stream or a jet. It was a wave. A tidal wave of shimmering, white-hot plasma that he unleashed in a great, sweeping arc, starting from the south and rolling north. It moved faster than a galloping horse, and everything it touched simply ceased to exist. Tents, men, horses, wagons, siege engines—all were reduced to ash and vapor in its path. It was the cleansing of a plague, silent but for the single, overwhelming roar of the flame itself.
He moved with a terrifying, deliberate speed, his colossal shadow passing over the dissolving army. He consumed the life force of thousands in a single pass, a torrent of energy so vast it made him feel as though his very atoms were vibrating with power. He felt the memories, the lives of the knights of the Reach, the chivalry, the songs, the loves, the petty hatreds—all of it became fuel for his ascension.
In the midst of this apocalypse, his golden eyes scanned the chaos, looking for his messenger. He saw him: a young knight, no older than twenty, scrambling away from the wave of fire, his fine, silver-inlaid armor splattered with mud, his face a mask of primal terror. He was Ser Victor, Lord Ormund's own nephew and standard-bearer. Perfect.
Krosis-Krif landed. His single footfall shook the earth for a mile in every direction. The impact threw the young knight to the ground. Krosis-Krif lowered his head, his snout, large as a sept, coming to rest mere yards from the gibbering boy. The heat from his scales alone was enough to make the air shimmer.
Victor Hightower looked up into the eye of his new god. He saw galaxies swirling in its molten gold depths. He felt its mind touch his, a gentle, chillingly intimate caress.
You will live, the thought came, calm and clear amidst the boy's shrieking terror. You will carry my word. You will return to your king and your queen. You will tell them what you have seen.
Flashes of imagery, not his own, burned into Victor's mind. A red dragon vanishing in the fog. A field of men melted to glass. A fleet of gold barges being consumed by fire. He was being shown the monster's work, a portfolio of destruction.
Tell them the wolf and the kraken are not the only powers in this world, the voice continued in his head. Tell them that a dragon who is not a slave sits in judgment. Tell them… the scales must be balanced.
With that, the mental presence withdrew. Krosis-Krif took a deep breath, inhaling the souls of the last dying men, then launched himself back into the sky. He gave the terrified, catatonic knight one last look before disappearing back into the clouds, leaving behind a field of absolute devastation.
Two weeks later, a thing that had once been Ser Victor Hightower was dragged before the Iron Throne. He was rail-thin, his hair was white, and he stared at everything with wide, unblinking eyes, muttering to himself in a constant, low drone.
"A mountain… it walked… it spoke in my head…"
Aemond and Otto stood before the throne, with Queen Alicent beside them, her face pale as milk. King Aegon was mercifully drunk in his chambers.
"Speak sense, man!" Otto commanded, his voice sharp with desperation. "What happened to the army? What of Lord Ormund?"
Victor's eyes focused on Otto, but they seemed to look right through him. He began to recite, his voice flat and devoid of emotion, like a child repeating a lesson. "The sky went dark. A voice said 'Eat your soul.' The fire came. Everyone burned. Everyone but me."
"Why you?" Aemond's voice was a dangerous whisper. "Why did it spare you?"
Ser Victor began to tremble violently. He clutched his head, his knuckles white. "The message," he sobbed. "I am the message."
"What message?" Alicent whispered, taking a step forward.
The young knight looked at her, and for a second, a terrifying, alien intelligence seemed to flicker in his eyes, as if the memory was so potent it carried its own echo.
"It said to tell you… the scales must be balanced."
The chamber fell into a silence so profound it was like the grave itself. Otto Hightower staggered back, his face ashen, finally understanding. Aemond's hand went to the hilt of his sword, his single eye wide with a mixture of terror and burning, incandescent hatred. This was not a beast. This was not a foreign power. This was a rival god, and it was passing judgment upon them all.
And hundreds of miles away, on Dragonstone, a raven arrived for Prince Daemon. It carried no message, only a single, perfectly preserved, fire-blackened oak leaf from the banner of House Oakheart. Daemon looked at the leaf, a relic from the heart of the Hightower host. He knew the bridge was broken. A slow, predatory smile spread across his face. The god had answered his prayer. The war was his to command.