The joyous news of Rhaena's birth spread like the wind, and the entire realm was swept up in celebration. Aegon personally returned to Drago
The joyous news of Rhaena's birth spread like the wind, and the entire realm was swept up in celebration.
Aegon personally returned to Dragonstone just to select a dragon egg for his eldest granddaughter.
He made his way to the mountainside behind Dragonmont, where an adult dragon resided—one that had never been tamed by the Targaryens of Dragonstone. Her name was Dreamshade.
After more than a century, Aegon was once again reunited with his old companion.
Dreamshade was now the second oldest dragon on Dragonstone after Balerion. Like him, she was born on the Valyrian Peninsula and, at over a hundred years old, was in her prime. Her glass-like scales had grown increasingly pure with the passage of time.
"Hello, beautiful girl," Aegon called out to her.
"Rrrye~" Dreamshade let out a strange sound. She tilted her head, staring at the silver mark on Aegon's forehead. From that mark, she sensed the aura of her master, Daenys.
Aegon strode forward, reached out, and gently touched the tip of her snout, murmuring, "You've grown into a fine lady. I'd like to take one of your eggs, may I?"
Dreamshade blinked her silver eyes, then gently rolled one of her own eggs toward Aegon with her tongue and placed it into his arms, letting out another soft "Rrrye~."
"Good girl! Watch over this place well, and don't let anyone come near."
He patted her nose affectionately, then glanced toward a hidden cave behind Dreamshade's nest—a secret treasury of House Targaryen. It held Daenys' body and many of the family's ancestral treasures.
With the blue, glass-like dragon egg in hand, Aegon left Dragonmont. After returning to King's Landing, he personally placed Dreamshade's egg into Rhaena's cradle.
"This egg is so beautiful. Thank you, Father," said Princess Alyssa, Aenys' wife, delighted.
She looked fondly at her daughter sleeping with the egg nestled in her arms. The sight was so heartwarming that she couldn't help but lean down and gently kiss her daughter's forehead again.
Aegon smiled and replied, "This is the offspring of a dragon from ancient Valyria. It suits Rhaena perfectly."
Alyssa, slightly thrilled by her father-in-law's special affection for Rhaena, said, "Aenys is just hopeless, spending all day buried in the Citadel. Next time he comes home, I'm giving him a proper scolding."
"Indeed. Urge him to let go of his burdens. Only those who can take things in stride can find happiness." Aegon nodded with a smile and turned to leave the nursery.
At the doorway, he glanced back at the sleeping Rhaena and said, "If the egg hatches, name it Dreamfyre."
"Yes, Father. Thank you for going to all this trouble," Alyssa replied with a smile.
In truth, Alyssa had no great ambitions for Aenys' claim to the throne. By the time she married him, he had already lost the fight for succession, and she had accepted that reality early on.
Aegon left the room, gently closing the door behind him.
After exiting Rhaenys' tower, he looked toward another tower at the rear of the palace. There, in the bedroom window at the top, a figure stood watching him from afar.
Aegon recognized her—it was Rhaenys.
Since the restoration of her tower, Queen Rhaenys had moved out of Visenya's, and now Aegon barely saw her once a month.
Still, with eunuchs now serving the royal women in the inner court, there was no longer any concern about odd rumors.
The figure at the window pulled the curtains shut, and Rhaenys vanished from Aegon's sight.
He let out a quiet sigh and climbed into the carriage.
The buildings outside flew by. Before long, Aegon arrived at Visenya's tower and stepped down.
There, Queen Visenya was already waiting at the door to greet him. She draped a cloak over his shoulders and took his hand as they walked inside.
As they walked, Visenya asked, "Still unwilling to see you, is she?"
"Yes. She's just like Aenys now—still hung up on the matter of the heir. Sigh..." Aegon sighed again.
Visenya, fully aware that Maegor had been named heir despite being the second son—and that Rhaenys was deeply resentful—offered a suggestion. "Why not betroth Rhaena to Maegor? That way, your sister's bloodline would still become queen. Perhaps it would ease her heart."
"That... might indeed resolve things." Aegon paused in thought, then nodded in agreement.
Pleased, Visenya gave him a kiss.
They returned to the bedchamber, washed, and spent the night in intimacy.
...
The next day.
News arrived that Princess Rhaena's dragon egg had hatched. Overjoyed, Aegon rushed over and beheld the baby dragon nestled in its swaddling clothes, covered in blue crystal-like scales. His heart swelled with happiness.
Even Rhaenys descended from her tower upon hearing the news. She, too, was delighted by the sight of the hatchling.
Dragons were the treasured legacy of House Targaryen. When one hatched alongside its rider in infancy, the bond formed was even closer—deeper, and far easier to control.
Aegon led Rhaenys to the balcony and shared with her Visenya's proposal from the night before—to marry Maegor to Rhaena.
Rhaenys immediately erupted in fury and flatly refused the idea of Rhaena being betrothed to Maegor.
Aegon felt a pang of regret, but since Rhaenys opposed it, he would not press the matter.
Maegor was already eleven years old. It was indeed time to start considering a marriage for the heir.
Aegon then sent word to the great lords of the realm, seeking a bride for Prince Maegor.
At the same time, Aegon planned to host a grand tourney. Under the pretext of the tournament, he would gather the great lords of the realm in King's Landing, using the occasion to host a social gathering aimed at strengthening bonds among the kingdom's vassals.
The moment the news spread, the great nobles were ecstatic.
They had always believed the Targaryens' tradition of close-kin marriages would prevent any unions between the royal family and Westerosi nobility. They never expected the king would host a matchmaking event for the heir prince.
In the twenty-first year since the Conquest, winter still lingered.
The tournament commenced in King's Landing with great fanfare. Despite the bitter cold, the nobles' enthusiasm for the heir prince's matchmaking remained undiminished. Hundreds of noble families brought their daughters to the capital.
For a time, the inns of King's Landing were filled to the brim.
In Aegon's hall, Prince Maegor sat beside the throne as hundreds of noblemen presented their daughters. One by one, the girls came forward to greet Prince Maegor or offer him a graceful dance.
Curiously, the noble ladies seemed more taken with the king himself than with the prince, unabashedly casting flirtatious glances toward Aegon.
Aegon, noticing this, could only smile wryly and retreat from the hall, leaving the spotlight to his son.
That day, Maegor did not immediately choose a bride.
He later joined the jousting tournament and publicly declared in King's Landing that he would win the championship and personally crown his future wife with the wreath of the Queen of Love and Beauty.
Aegon and his court were delighted by this bold proclamation—Maegor's fiery and spirited nature was truly endearing.
Aegon and the nobles attended the joust in person.
Maegor lived up to his word, toppling three Kingsguard knights in a row and claiming the final victory.
When he approached the stands where the noblewomen sat, holding the [Queen of Love and Beauty] crown in his hand, the crowd of young ladies could hardly contain themselves. Some even fainted from sheer excitement.
What stunned Aegon and his court most was Maegor's choice—he placed the crown on the head of Lady Ceryse Hightower.
Lady Ceryse was ten years older than Maegor. She had a full, alluring figure and carried herself with the elegance of a mature woman. Every gesture exuded a natural charm. Her large, glistening eyes seemed to shimmer with boundless affection, and just one glance was enough to captivate the heart.
Aegon hadn't expected his son to favor this type of woman and couldn't help but burst into laughter on the spot.
Lady Ceryse, blushing like a flower in bloom, happily accepted Prince Maegor's proposal.
To celebrate his sister's extraordinary match, Lord Hightower hosted a lavish banquet in King's Landing, inviting nobles from across Westeros—an impressive display of the Southwest Warden's immense wealth.
The kingdom's nobility offered their heartfelt congratulations to Prince Maegor and Lady Ceryse.
At the banquet, Aegon and Lord Hightower came to an agreement: since Maegor was still young, a grand wedding for him and Lady Ceryse would be held two years later.
...
Since the twenty-first year after the Conquest, the Targaryen dynasty had seen few wars.
Any occasional Dornish uprisings or acts of banditry within the realm were swiftly and easily crushed.
But the continent of Essos remained volatile.
With the Targaryen dynasty acting as a suzerain power in the region, chaos persisted and conflict never truly ceased.
According to the maesters of the Citadel, since the establishment of the Protectorate of the West, there had only been a little over one month each year without fighting in Essos—solely because during that brief window, the various nations gathered in King's Landing to negotiate, hoping Aegon would mediate.
Yet Aegon's method of mediation was anything but conventional. The more he mediated, the fiercer the fighting became.
He deftly manipulated the rivalries between nations, sometimes favoring one side, other times pressuring the other—always maneuvering with great skill.
As a result, relations among the nations grew ever more strained, the wars ever harder to end, while the Targaryen dynasty quietly expanded its interests and strengthened its position amid the chaos.
...
Time rolled steadily onward.
The people of Westeros often said that King Aegon spent the first half of his life unifying the Seven Kingdoms with blood and fire, and the second half building them with bricks and mortar.
Aegon frequently traveled across construction sites throughout the Crownlands, closely inspecting the progress of the Kingsroad and carefully reviewing drainage works outside King's Landing. He even launched a canal project to connect the Gods Eye to the Trident.
If the canal were completed, it would allow goods from the Crownlands to travel by river to the North.
As its name suggests, the Trident splits into three forks, each leading to one of Westeros's major regions.
The Green Fork flows to the North.
The Blue Fork connects Ironman's Bay, the Iron Islands, and the Riverlands.
The Red Fork leads to the Westerlands.
A branch of the Gods Eye, the Tear River, runs directly to King's Landing.
If the canal were successfully opened, it would greatly stimulate the economy of the Crownlands. Goods from the Crownlands could be easily shipped throughout the Seven Kingdoms, and raw materials from the other regions could just as easily be transported back.
Aegon seemed to have inherited a fondness for infrastructure, as if he carried the legacy of a great builder from another world. Since the twenty-first year of the Conquest, the realm had seen wave after wave of real estate and infrastructure projects.
With peace prevailing, time passed swiftly. In the blink of an eye, it was the twenty-third year of the Conquest.
Prince Maegor, heir to the throne and Prince of Dragonstone, married Lady Ceryse Hightower at the Starry Sept in Oldtown. The wedding was personally officiated by Pope Aegon.
Maegor was only thirteen years old, while his bride was ten years his senior…
Yet all the nobles who witnessed the bedding ceremony agreed: the prince was a vigorous and passionate husband.
Maegor even boasted that he had fulfilled his marital duties more than ten times on their wedding night.
"Last night, I gave House Targaryen a new son," he declared at breakfast the next morning.
However, the following year, House Targaryen did indeed welcome a new son…
But the child, named Aegon after his grandfather, was born to Prince Aenys and Princess Alyssa.
Once again, the Seven Kingdoms were filled with celebration. The newborn prince was strong and carried a fierce spirit. His grandfather, the Dragonlord Aegon, personally praised him as "a boy with a warrior's bearing."
Because Aegon gave his name to the child, to distinguish between the two, people began calling Aenys's son "Little Aegon."
During these two years, tensions within the royal family had eased considerably.
However, Aenys remained obsessed with his studies at the Citadel and rarely returned home—sometimes not even once a month.
Yet even in this near "semi-retired" state, he had fathered both a son and a daughter, dealing a harsh blow to Maegor's pride.
Though Maegor spent his nights in passionate union with his wife—and occasionally indulged in the pleasures of the city's brothels—two full years had passed without any sign of an heir, not even a bastard.
This gave rise to considerable gossip and negative speculation about the heir prince throughout the realm.
Seeing this, Aegon tried to comfort Maegor, urging him not to worry. He told him that if his wife still couldn't conceive by the time he turned twenty, he would help him find a fertile mistress.
And if Maegor still had no children by the age of thirty, he would have to adopt his brother Aenys's son as his heir.
Left with no better choice, Maegor reluctantly agreed to his father's terms.
Aegon then publicly announced the decision: if Prince Maegor remained childless by the age of thirty, he would adopt Aenys's son, Little Aegon, as his heir.
When Rhaenys's side of the family heard this, they expressed no objections. They had no qualms about seeing Little Aegon become Maegor's successor.
Aenys himself was also relieved by the news and began returning to the Red Keep more frequently than before.
...
Over these two years, Aegon's efforts to bring the Faith of the Seven under control had continued to advance steadily.
Although the Father's Son had been sidelined by papal decree and was no longer allowed to involve himself in Church affairs, Aegon was still meticulously completing the [New Covenant of the Seven].
In the second volume of the covenant, written by Aegon himself, he continued to write from the perspective of Aenys, the "savior," expanding on the unfinished parts of the [Dream of the Gods].
The first volume had declared that the people of Westeros must quell the conflicts in Essos to prevent the Seven from destroying the world out of disgust for mankind.
Now, the Targaryen dynasty had taken direct action—launching a holy crusade against Lys and establishing the [Protectorate of the West] to mediate conflicts on the continent.
While Aegon's mediation often intensified the fighting, his actions still aligned with the first volume's teachings, fulfilling the covenant laid out in the [Dream of the Gods].
As for the second volume, Aegon intended to further deify House Targaryen.
He sought to add a sheath to the double-edged sword born of the Citadel's innovations—allowing it to serve its purpose without spiraling out of control.
Aegon understood well that his relentless pursuit of technology and grand-scale industrialization would, in time, bear dazzling fruit—guns, cannons, and other weapons of war. And when that day came, these very inventions could pose a grave threat to the dragons.
Dragons had long been the cornerstone of Targaryen rule. If they ever lost their invincibility, the dynasty's foundations could be shaken—and, in a worst-case scenario, overthrown by a rising bourgeois class. The extinction of the Targaryens would no longer be unthinkable.
Aegon's solution to this looming threat lay hidden in the second volume of the New Covenant.
Drawing inspiration from the Hindu caste system and the institution of Egyptian pharaohs, he blended the two into a new religious doctrine. Through this, he hoped to cement House Targaryen's sacred and untouchable status.
After all, the Hindu caste system continued to function well into the 21st century—an age of advanced technology—and still exerted deep influence over India's social structure and class divisions.
This alone spoke volumes about the system's enduring power and resilience.
It also underscored the importance of Aegon's religious concept in preserving the rule of his house.
...
[Upto 20 chapters ahead for now]
p@treon com/ BlurryDream