The nights were warmer near the chamber now.
Not from torches. Not from furnaces. From them.
The heat that pulsed from beneath the stones wasn't fire, but life. Tangible and rhythmic, like a second heartbeat filling the walls. I sat cross-legged near the eggs, not touching them this time, just listening. There was nothing to do but wait — and dragons rarely arrived when called.
Vaedron slept nearby, his enormous form curled protectively around the back half of the chamber entrance. Anyone who even thought about entering would think twice. Rhazal remained close but restless. He came and went through the upper windows, wings cutting through night like whispers of storm winds. He had always been twitchy.
Tiraxes cracked first.
It was nearly silent. A thin line, no bigger than a fingernail, split across the deep red shell. A sigh, a shift, a slow scrape. No dramatic burst, no shattering explosion. Just a clean, deliberate opening — like a creature not impatient to be born, but already ready.
I stood and watched.
The egg peeled open from the center, red flaking into dust. What emerged was lean, serpentine, and beautifully alien — the dragon's body was long and coiled, wings tucked sharp to its side. Tiraxes's deep crimson scales shimmered faintly in the torchlight, as if they had been soaked in wine and blood.
It looked directly at me.
Not blindly, not newborn — aware.
It screeched once — not a roar, not yet, just a sharp and short cry — then stretched its limbs, claws clicking softly against the stone. Its wings unfurled partway, testing the space.
"Welcome," I said quietly.
No one else could hear. That was the point.
Tiraxes took to the chamber immediately. Not climbing, not flying, but slinking through the shadows with careful grace. Fast. Controlled. He was young, yes, but there was a tension in his movements. Coiled and alert.
A day later, Nyxarys followed.
The violet-silver shell trembled throughout the night. The crack came not as a line, but a sudden bloom of fractures that webbed across its surface, light glinting off each one. She broke out in pieces — headfirst, tail whipping after her — and let out a sharper sound than her brother, something like a hiss wrapped in thunder.
Her scales shimmered like quicksilver. Not smooth — shifting. She looked smaller than Tiraxes at first, but when she stretched, her wingspan told the truth: she was built for air. Not power. Precision.
She spun once in the chamber before curling beside her brother. He gave her a brief glance but didn't move.
They knew each other. Of course they did.
Sorynth came the next morning.
No warning. No crackling sound. I returned to the chamber and found him already sitting among the shards of orange shell, alert and still. His eyes — a piercing gold — watched me approach as if he had been waiting for me.
Not shy. Not loud. Not unsure.
Just there.
Of the three, he looked the most normal — no gleaming shimmer, no sharp lines. His orange scales had a quiet strength to them. But when he moved — when he suddenly darted behind Vaedron in a blur of motion — I understood what he truly was.
Unpredictable.
Tiraxes. Nyxarys. Sorynth.
All three hatched within days.
All three healthy.
All three hungry.
I fed them myself for the first two feedings — raw goat meat, strips laid neatly across stone slabs. They devoured without hesitation, but without fighting. No posturing. No screeching. They didn't challenge one another.
They were not rivals. They were a pack.
Even Vaedron watched them quietly, eyes half-lidded but not disinterested. He didn't make a sound. Just breathed deeply and stayed nearby.
When Sorynth curled up beside him and closed his eyes, Vaedron shifted to make room.
I said nothing.
I gave them two more nights.
By the third morning, I knew it was time to return.
The ride back was uneventful. Rhazal stayed near me the whole time, occasionally darting ahead like a scout. Vaedron followed behind, massive and slow-moving, but he no longer lagged. He seemed oddly energized now, like having the trio born had stirred something in him.
He didn't soar. But he moved.
We returned to the main camp by sunset of the fourth day.
Daenerys was in the command tent when I arrived. She stood from the map table and simply looked at me.
"You're back."
"I said I would be."
"And?"
"Nothing unexpected."
I didn't give her more. Not yet.
Her eyes searched mine, but she didn't press. We understood each other too well by now. She could feel something had changed. She just didn't know what.
That night, we gathered with Missandei and the commanders around the fire to review our approach to Yunkai. The scouts reported mercenaries in the city — possibly the Second Sons, though that was uncertain. The gates were closed. No messengers had been sent out.
Daenerys asked pointed questions, but she let me control the pacing of the assault plans. We would approach carefully. We had time.
The freedmen needed rest. The Unsullied were disciplined, but still new to open warfare as a united army. And the dragons — while impressive — were not yet large enough to level cities.
Except for Vaedron, maybe.
I didn't rush them.
Everything would come in its time.
I watched Daenerys later that night as she stood alone at the edge of camp, staring toward the lights of Yunkai in the far distance. She wore no cloak despite the cold. She looked powerful, like a statue carved from will alone.
I walked beside her, silently.
After a while, she spoke without looking at me.
"You've changed."
"How?"
"You're calmer now. Or colder. I can't tell which."
I said nothing.
"I don't know everything about you," she added, voice soft now. "But I trust you."
That part, she meant.
I looked toward the sky where Rhazal soared. Then farther, imagining Tiraxes's shadow one day joining him. And Nyxarys behind. Sorynth circling low like a ghost.
Soon.
Very soon.
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