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For the next few days Limpick locked himself in the Red Temple's library. The room was small—smaller than his chamber on Dragonstone—three walls lined with dark wooden shelves packed tight with books, some upright, some stacked, all covered in thick dust. He read slowly. Some books were in High Valyrian, others in Pentoshi, and a few in scripts he couldn't read at all—maybe Valyrian, maybe Braavosi, maybe something older that died with Valyria and only these pages kept alive. He skipped what he couldn't understand and copied what he could.
He copied everything useful. Dragon-egg hatching temperatures. How color and breed were linked. Signs that an egg was ready. What an egg needed during the process. The books contradicted one another. Some said to burn the egg in fire until the shell cracked. Others said to bury it in cooling ashes. Some claimed it needed a drop of human blood every day for a hundred days. Others said the egg needed nothing at all—it would hatch when it was ready. Limpick wrote it all down on sheet after sheet of paper until the stack grew thick.
Daenerys came every day to help. She sat across from him, turned pages, and read the passages he couldn't understand. Her High Valyrian was better than his, and her Pentoshi was fluent—she had lived in Pentos once, years ago, in Illyrio's house when she was smaller, thinner, and more afraid. She had forgotten most of that time, but the languages stayed. She read aloud, then translated into the Common Tongue and wrote the words down. Her handwriting was neat and flowing, like water over stone. Limpick watched her fingers move across the page, ink stains still caught in the knuckles she could never quite wash away. He remembered Melisandre on Dragonstone, her warm steady hand guiding his as she taught him the Valyrian letters. Daenerys's hand was small and cool, but just as steady. She wrote in silence, lips pressed together, brow faintly furrowed, as if this were the most important thing in the world.
Viserys never came to the library. He stayed by the brazier with the three eggs. He had moved them onto a low table beside the fire, layered with three cloths—coarse at the bottom, wool in the middle, silk on top. Limpick didn't ask where the silk had come from. Viserys turned each egg once a day, flipping them so every side received even heat. He cleaned the shells every morning with a soft cloth and warm water, wiping away dust and fingerprints until the eggs shone like polished moonstones. He spoke to them in High Valyrian—soft, low words about his family, about Aegon, about Balerion, Vhagar, and Meraxes, the dragons he had never seen except in books and dreams. His voice was gentle, the way a man speaks to a newborn. His face held an expression Limpick had never seen on him before—not pride, not greed, not madness. Just quiet tenderness. It looked so good on him that Limpick was almost afraid to watch, afraid it would vanish the moment Viserys noticed.
On the seventh day the light on the eggs changed.
Limpick was in the library copying notes while Daenerys read a Pentoshi text aloud. She stopped mid-sentence. Limpick looked up and saw her staring at the open doorway, mouth parted. He followed her gaze. The corridor was dark, but at the far end golden light poured from the main hall—not the usual orange-red of the brazier, but bright, blinding gold, like someone had lit a sun inside the fire. Limpick set down his pen and stood. Daenerys followed.
In the hall Viserys knelt before the brazier. The three eggs glowed. Not the old faint pulsing light—this was steady, brilliant gold pouring from every scaled ridge on the shells, turning the entire hall into a sea of sunset gold. The largest egg moved. Not rolling—something inside was pushing. A thin crack appeared from top to bottom. Golden light blazed through it, brighter and thicker than the shell's own glow, like molten gold. More cracks followed, racing across the surface until the shell split like petals opening. A tiny gray-white claw pushed out, scales soft and wet, then pulled back. It pushed out again, longer this time, hooked the edge of the shell, and pulled. The egg split in two. The creature tumbled free.
It was small—barely larger than Limpick's palm. Gray-white, glistening, scales still soft and plastered to its body like newborn skin. Its eyes were closed. Its mouth opened and it made a thin, mouse-like sound—squeak, squeak, squeak—exactly like Ember had made when he was tiny. Viserys reached out, fingers shaking so hard his whole body trembled. His knees were on the stone but he didn't feel the pain. His hand was inches from the hatchling when the second egg cracked.
This one was slightly larger, its shell a deeper gray-white with a faint golden sheen. It crawled out, eyes still shut, and pawed at the broken shell fragments. After two steps it stopped, opened its mouth, and let out a higher, sharper cry—like a silver bell. Viserys's hand froze in the air. He looked from the first hatchling to the second, then back again. His face held the same expression Limpick had seen on Dragonstone when Melisandre placed the first piece of dragonglass in his palm and said, "This is for you." Disbelief. Terror that it was only a dream. Terror that he would wake and find everything gone.