Chapter 13: The God's Silence
The first pyre was the town of Sallydance. It was a peaceful place on the shores of the Gods Eye, known for its weaving and its quiet piety. Prince Aemond Targaryen and Vhagar descended upon it not as conquerors, but as a judgment from a hateful god. There was no warning, no demand for surrender. There was only fire. Vhagar's breath, thick and green as bile, turned thatched roofs to cinders and stone houses to bubbling slag. Men and women who ran into the streets were hunted down, their screams adding a fleeting, treble note to the deep, bass roar of the flames.
From Sallydance, they moved to Lord Harroway's Town, then to the fields of House Darry, then to the lands of House Lychester. Aemond did not follow the rhythm of war. He followed no strategic objective. He was simply erasing the map, turning the fertile green lands of the Trident into a blackened, smoking scar. He was painting a masterpiece of atrocity, and he was signing his name to it in letters of fire a hundred feet high, a message for an audience of one.
The news of this rampage reached Harrenhal like a tidal wave of terror. The Riverlords, who had just days before been congratulating themselves on their wise choice of allegiance, now stormed the Hall of a Hundred Hearths, their faces pale with shock and fury.
"Prince Daemon! Lord Harroway's Town is ash!" Lord Darry cried, his fine clothes singed, his face streaked with soot. He had ridden nonstop to reach the dubious safety of the great castle. "Aemond is burning everything! He is not taking plunder or demanding fealty, he is just… unmaking the world!"
Daemon stood before the high seat, a flagon of wine in his hand, projecting an aura of bored, aristocratic calm. Inside, his mind was a hornet's nest of disbelief and fury. This was not the plan. Aemond was supposed to be cowering in King's Landing.
"The boy is throwing a tantrum," Daemon said, his voice a silken drawl. "A rabid dog snapping at the heels of a god. He is desperate. It is the last gasp of a dying cause."
"A last gasp that is choking my people to death!" roared Lord Bracken, his face purple with rage. "We knelt to you! We pledged our swords to your Queen! We did so because you hold this castle! You command the power that humbled these black stones. Where is that power now? Where is your protection?"
"My protection?" Daemon's eyes narrowed. "You are lords of the Trident. You have men, you have swords. Defend your lands. Am I your nursemaid as well as your prince?"
"Our men cannot fight a dragon!" Lord Blackwood shouted, stepping forward, his hand on his sword. "Especially not Vhagar! She is burning my lands as we speak, my prince! She is making for Raventree Hall itself! You brought us into this war, and we came, believing in your strength. Show it to us!"
The hall was filled with the angry shouts of desperate men. They were looking at him, their new protector, and their eyes were filled with accusation. His authority, won so easily, was evaporating before his very eyes. He held up a hand, silencing them.
"You will have your protection," he said, his voice dropping to a low, commanding tone. "Aemond One-Eye has made himself a target. A great and foolish one. Return to your keeps. Muster your men, but do not engage him. Keep him occupied. I will deal with the dog and his ancient bitch myself."
He dismissed them with a wave, his confidence a carefully constructed lie. They left, grumbling but partially mollified, clinging to the promise of the man who had taken Harrenhal. When the last of them had gone, Daemon swept the flagon from the table, sending it crashing against the stone floor. He strode to the highest window of the Kingspyre Tower, looking out over the misty expanse of the Gods Eye. His heart hammered in his chest. He was no longer a commander. He was a supplicant.
He closed his eyes, focusing his will, his entire being, on the pact he had made. He projected his thoughts out into the world, a frantic, silent prayer to the abyss he had foolishly tried to leash.
You wanted balance? Here it is! The scales are tipped! Aemond and Vhagar, the single greatest weapon of the Greens, are laying waste to my new territory, to the Queen's new vassals. Their destruction weakens us, it strengthens them! He is your target. The ultimate prize. He is out in the open, arrogant and exposed. Destroy him. Uphold your end of our bargain. Show me your power.
He sent the message again and again, a desperate, demanding pulse of intent. He had pointed the weapon. Now, he waited for it to fire.
Deep beneath the placid surface of the Gods Eye, in the crushing, silent dark, Krosis-Krif felt the plea. It was a thin, needle-like spike of anxiety and demand from his new pawn. It amused him. The little rogue actually thought their pact was one of equals. He thought he could give orders.
Simultaneously, Krosis-Krif felt the other, far more glorious sensation. The psychic banquet being laid for him across the Riverlands. Aemond's rampage was a symphony of terror, a wave of death energy so vast and potent it was like the sun rising in the dark. The screams of the dying, the agony of the burning, the sheer, unadulterated chaos—it was a finer meal than any army he had consumed. Aemond was not just killing people; he was rendering the very land down into its base components of fear and energy, a feast for a god.
And he wanted Krosis-Krif to stop it? To kill the chef in the middle of preparing the most exquisite meal he had ever tasted? It was laughably absurd.
Aemond's logic was flawed. He thought Krosis-Krif would be drawn to the feast to physically consume the dead. He did not understand that for a being of Krosis-Krif's power, the act of mass death itself was nourishing. The psychic energy released was a delicacy he could savor from miles away. Why would he interrupt the harvest?
And the strategic implications were perfect. Daemon had tipped the scales too far in the Blacks' favor. Now, Aemond, in his madness, was diligently tipping them back. He was devastating the resources and lands of Daemon's newest, most powerful allies. He was eroding Daemon's authority, proving him a protector who could not protect. Every village Aemond burned was a chip taken from Daemon's credibility. It was a beautiful, self-correcting chaos.
Let Aemond burn the Riverlands. Let Vhagar tire herself. Let Daemon squirm in his stolen castle, his promises turning to ash in his mouth. Let the two angriest dogs of the Targaryen line bleed each other's holdings dry.
Krosis-Krif did not answer the plea. He did not stir from his cavern. He simply lay in the comfortable dark, savoring the rich, complex flavors of Aemond's atrocity, and listened to the delightful sound of his pawn's frantic, unanswered prayers. The silence of a god, he was beginning to understand, was a far more potent tool of manipulation than any act of destruction.
For three days, Harrenhal was a prison of impotence for Daemon Targaryen. Every few hours, a new rider would arrive, his horse lathered, his face a mask of horror.
"Stone Hedge is burning, my prince! Lord Tully's lands are a pyre!"
"He fell upon the crossroads inn! Slaughtered everyone! The merchants, the refugees, everyone!"
"Raventree Hall, my prince!" Lord Blackwood fell to his knees, his face utterly broken. "The great weirwood… a thousand years old… he burned it. He laughed as it burned."
Daemon's calm façade had long since crumbled. He paced the Hall of a Hundred Hearths like a caged wolf, his face a thundercloud, his hand never straying from Dark Sister. He had flown Caraxes to the highest tower, ready to fly out, but where? Aemond and Vhagar were a phantom of destruction, never staying in one place for more than an hour. To challenge them was to guess where the lightning would strike next, and to guess wrong meant death. He was reliant on a power that refused to answer his call.
On the fourth day, Lady Sabitha Frey arrived, her horse bleeding from a dozen cuts, her own armor scorched and dented. She strode into the hall, her eyes blazing with a fury that matched Daemon's own.
"My husband's castle at the Crossing is under siege by what's left of the Lannister host, emboldened by the One-Eye's rampage," she said, her voice raw. "And you sit here, Prince Daemon? In this haunted pile of rock? You promised us protection! You promised us the power that took this castle!"
"The Prince is considering his strategy, my lady," Ser Robert Paege, one of Daemon's new retainers, interjected nervously.
"Strategy?" Lady Sabitha laughed, a harsh, grating sound. "My people are dying! My lands are burning! What strategy is there in this hall but wine and silence? We knelt to you because we feared you more than we feared the Greens. It appears we chose poorly. Your shadow has abandoned you, Prince."
The barb struck home, hard. Daemon turned on her, his eyes blazing with a humiliated fury. "You dare question my…"
He was cut off by the arrival of another lord, this one so covered in mud and blood he was barely recognizable. "The children… by the Trident…" he sobbed, collapsing. "He's… he's hunting the children…"
Daemon stared, his mind finally, truly accepting the truth. He had been played. The pact was a lie. He was not a partner; he was a fool. He had been used to secure the Riverlands, only to have them be the fuel for the monster's true purpose: endless, balanced chaos. He had unleashed this thing, and now it was running wild, and the first casualty was his own authority, his own honor. The silence from the Gods Eye was not a strategic delay. It was a message. It was the monster's laughter.
He turned away from the accusing eyes of the Riverlords, his face pale. He strode to the great, empty hearth, the symbol of his hollow victory. He had promised these people a king's protection, and all he had delivered was a god's silence. He looked into the cold, dead ashes and saw his own reflection: a rogue who had tried to bargain with the abyss, only to find himself falling into it. The price of providence was to discover you were never the one receiving it. You were simply part of the payment.