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raayllum · 24 days ago

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What Is Up With Humans, and a Brief History of Xadia

Because season seven gave us two important pieces of the puzzle and while we still don't have a full picture, I'm at least willing to try to assemble them. Let's go.

Elves and Dragons or First Elves vs Dragons

Previously to season 6, I'd speculated that the Archdragons and the First elves were peers. This was due to certain similar language used to describe them ("Oh Zubeia, your heavenly majesty" / "our adversary was literally a being from the heavens") as well as association: "In the name of the dragons and the First Elves" (4x03). It also provided an interesting contrast of the 'most powerful' elves and dragons being allied with one another, whereas the other elves were more subservient to the dragons (acting as the Dragonguard, bringing gifts, elements of worship) if not also enforcing their will over them (the Drake riders).

And it seemed, thanks to season 6, that this was straightforwardly confirmed. The Archdragons, even the draconic monarchy, worked alongside the Cosmic Council to maintain the Cosmic Order, per Leola's execution utilizing the Dragon Prince, Anak Araw, as a witness for something the Council hadn't even, perhaps, directly seen as it happened. Continuing into season seven, this association was maintained without any real hiccups. Aaravos states that "the dragons and the elves, all the arrogant fools blinded by the searing light of their own self-righteousness. They stand high, and they will fall hard" (7x01).

There's a little inclination that maybe things weren't always peaceful between the First Elves and Archdragons, given that the bite of the latter can destroy the mortal vessel of the former, but we don't have any conflict confirmed until we get to 7x07, and then boy do we.

3,000 years ago, we know of at least one battle between an archdragon and a first elf. We also know that Laurelion was battling the creature in their mortal form, hence why it could be (temporarily) destroyed, even if we don't know how long it'd take for their stars to re-align. We also don't know what they were fighting over. Perhaps who'd have control over the Earth, or Laurelion, protecting humanity from a destructive Archdragon — except...

Humans (see those consistently five fingers?) forged the Nova Blade, uniquely made to kill First Elves' mortal forms. Whatever conflict was happening, humans were ultimately more on the Archdragons' side than the Stars', and utilized what would become a basis for dark magic later — using a magical creature's body part — to forge a sword of great power.

It casts this line from Ziard in a new light, to say the least, whether it was genuine or just snide snark either way:

(More on Elarion and timeline things in a bit.)

We don't know, of course, whether Laurelion and Shiruakh's battle was unique and singular and individual, the beginning or culmination of a long drawn out conflict, or if other Archdragons and First Elves were battling one another. Just because humans were creating something to take down Startouch elves doesn't mean they were on the dragons' side either, or what magical (or non-magical) status they had at the time, 3000 years ago. But we do know, at one point since then and before Elarion a thousand years later, the First Elves and Archdragons came together to create and enforce the Cosmic Order, as Aaravos states:

To create a system that worked for them as a unit, and worked against humans. And while an oppressive system doesn't need a ('justified') reason to oppress beyond "having people on the bottom means you get to stay on top" this is where we get into the meta-narrative of it all.

Season Six: Revealing the Hand of God

The meta-narrative, or metafiction, is a form of fiction that emphasizes its own narrative structure in a way that inherently reminds the audience that they are reading or viewing a fictional work. The pulling back of the curtain, or when stories emphasize storytelling (think Hamilton following a character who's constantly worried about if, or how, his story will be told... while you are actively watching it be told.) Think of how different ATLA would be, for example, if we knew directly how the Avatar was chosen, and therefore got into the ethicals of some grand being putting a burden uniquely on the shoulders of a young child, compared to "this is just the story's worldbuilding, and we don't know how it's chosen."

Or, in other words, TDP's writers creating a purposefully unfair magical system in which to explore the conflicts that system would create (because stories are often thought experiments) but with no one in-universe to blame for that system. It just is. Or, I should say, it just was.

Putting characters in your story who Chose who got magic, or who didn't (and the consequences of it) when those choices were fundamentally Unfair, creates someone that we, the audience, and the characters, can blame for that unfair system. There is someone to be angry at. There is someone to hold accountable. The Cosmic Council decided, for whatever reason, to give magic, or create beings (elves) that had magic, and to have beings who not only don't, but cannot and should not have magic. And it was consciously decided, by people who exist within the story and within the narrative, not just by the outside hand of god creators, that humans would not.

Was this punishment for crafting the Nova Blade, and the humans (or magic-less elves?) who did side with the First Elves against the archdragons were given magic and became the primal elves (everyone but the stars)? But if that's the case, why and how did the First Elves and Archdragons — the latter previously possibly being allies of the humans — become united against humans? Did the Archdragons throw humans under the bus when the dust settled? Were the Archdragons angry at humans for, presumably, crafting the Scale of Shiruakh into a weapon as well? (We know that First Elves rarely take mortal form; was it different Before, and Nova Blade happy wielding humans gave them the incentive to stay more up into the heavens?)

We also know that pre-Fall of Elarion, the humans thought that the Stars would save them from the dragons...:

Elarion, fading bloom, afraid to wilt and dim and die, she searched the dark for but a spark and caught the dragons’ hungry eye. Elarion, frightened waif, reached bone-white branches to the night, the stars she asked their light to cast and stop the dragons’ fiery might.1

It happened long ago, when humans had only just learned to hold fire in their hands without burning. They nurtured their precious primal flames secretly—in the dark of night, beneath shadows and shrouds—as cultivating its glow drew the eyes and ire of monsters. Eventually, for the audacity of their fire, they were hunted, and—though they looked to the stars for salvation—the stars, too, looked down upon them with disdain. [...] It cannot be, wept others. The stars would not betray us!2

The dragons directly, not the Stars, had become the enemy of humans over primal magic usage, even though humans made the Nova Blade, and even though the dragons had once been allies, making it seem like an 180 switch happened in the interim. And we do know (although this could've been Leola) that eventually the stars did help humans, even if they did so without caring:

And so the humans learned to wait. They stared into the inky black above, patiently waiting for the stars to share their knowledge, their guidance, their brilliant light—and one day, the heavens finally reached for them. Held them. Blessed them. The humans rejoiced. We are saved, they cried. The stars have finally answered us! We were right to be patient—we were right to wait!3

It makes me wonder whether the Archdragons at the time made the decision for humans to not have magic, and the Stars agreed to enforce it, or whether it was the opposite / mutual.

Moving on: whatever the agreement between them was, one thing held fast of consciously choosing to deprive humans of primal magic, and then doing their best to maintain that deprivation.

Then it all changed, and an Order that hinged so completely on humans not having (primal) magic, at having humans at the bottom of the hierarchy, that it was irreparably broken, seemingly, by just a tiny taste of it, passing from Leola to her human friends.

This act, however motivated, is the beginning of the end. The start of the long slow spiral to chaos. (6x09) / So it is only fitting that I deliver their fear, the Great Unravelling, in Leola's name. (7x06)

My first part of the over arching theory I'm working towards, then, is that the Cosmic Order was made to keep elves and dragons and even archdragons in line, yes, but primarily to keep humans in line.

But why? What is it about humans that make them so unique, or dangerous, that they need to be 'supervised'? Well, I think it went further than

More Than Primal Magic

We know thanks to Callum and other sources (Ripples) that humans can connect to arcanums, and can connect to more than one, with Aaravos being our only example of an elf having more than one arcanum. It begs the question of, if Callum could do it, if there was any truly stopping from humans from acquiring it due to their nature (i.e. cuddlemonkeys like Stella are also born without arcanums, and then connect due to their environmental factors). But that's a post for another day, and I think that "humans connecting to primal magic" is only part of what scared the Cosmic Council.

And what I'm about to propose is, admittedly, both a simplistic and complicated answer for what was so special about humans. (It is also somewhat inspired by a HTTYD fanfic called "Hitchups" I read 11 years ago as a worldbuilding concept, so go figure). However, the more I turned it over in my head, the more I felt like it best reflected what we've seen throughout the series so far, so here it is.

Humans are dangerous because they have Imagination.

And I know on first glance that seems and sounds stupid, but bear with me. Humans, specifically, seem to have more the ability in-universe to imagine new, better, possibilities than we see from the elves and dragons, without prompting in the same manner. Whether it's the human gazing upon the new Sea of the Cast Out...

The wisest of the humans looked upon the water. His own reflection smiled back at him, and he dared to imagine what such power would feel like in his own hands, should he be allowed to hold it. Imagine, he thought, if I were more than what I am.

or Harrow's urgings to Callum, a son who already dreamed of peace even without knowing of the living dragon egg (which is what Rayla and Zubeia needed to get to the same place):

Callum, who believes that primal magic for himself is possible, even when every elf around him disagrees, and then he's right. Or Rayla's reflections on Callum, yes, but humans at large, as though elves struggle routinely with doing the same (and they do, constantly harkening back to the past otherwise):

The human kicked dirt at her, and Rayla scraped at her eyes, angry—infuriated, even. Humans were frustrating. Humans were clever. Humans could do anything, they could be anything, they could take their own fates and change them—4

Rayla, who offers up her gift of sacrifice to Rex Igneous to be the same like everything before, and it's only through Ezran's thought process and Barius' invention that it turns into anything else. Anything new, or successful.

Or the Orphan Queen, who alone sees through Aaravos' eyes, and then manages to convince everyone else who loved him that he's a traitor, who saw the possibility no one else were able to consider. Or the Jailer, who was tasked with creating the prison as opposed to just a primal elf mage, like one couldn't.

REX IGNEOUS: Long ago, it was a human who saw through the Fallen Star's schemes, and helped Xadia put an end to them. (4x08) AKIYU: I was visited by a human mage who called herself the Jailer. The Archdragons had given the Jailer a daunting task to design a magical prison that could hold a Startouch elf. She needed my powers to craft the prison itself. [...] The puzzle is the real prison, she told me with a proud smile. (5x05)

In this, the humans taught me another lesson.5 [...] Aaravos thinks that if he cared for the idea [of birthdays], he’d like to remember the taste of a smooth red fruit a human had plucked from a tree for him, once. It had been so crisp, and so sweet.6

And this idea — that while elves can, humans are better at introducing New Ideas, is not a new one either. Although we see Rayla, Janai, and other Xadian creatures think of ideas/plans, they are usually still operating within the means of what they Know to be possible—to use illusions as a Moonshadow elf, to cut Amaya's line off, to use their lightning abilities or strength—as opposed to what is half-started or unlikely (the bulk of Callum's magic in season 1, and again in 3x09). And we see this best through the way that humans, 9/10, are the ones who introduce Breaking the Cycle to Xadian creatures. We see this with not-so-great ideas as well: humans do the thing, and Xadians eventually copy them.

Now, some of this is an oversimplification, of course. Dragons and elves do introduce some new ideas to human characters, teach them magic/spells, and take new ideas from one another. Callum is usually more optimistic and likely to see a new spin on things than Rayla, for example, but Rayla is the one who sees Esmeray as something other than a monster. Most of the time, though, when elves or dragons are influencing human characters though, it is through revealing information (the scale necklace; Esmeray and Luna Tenebris; that Aaravos can possess people; Terry with Aaravos' plans, etc), not necessarily inventing new perspectives.

Meanwhile, humans reveal information a good deal of the time too: Ezran discovers and shares that the egg wasn't destroyed at all; Callum finds the truth of whether Rayla's parents ran away; the Orphan Queen, as noted, revealed Aaravos' treachery; and Corvus can tell that something is up with that island (7x01).

Elves, meanwhile, tend to be much more... follower-esque. Runaan does not kill unless he is ordered to ("and then Callum will decide if you live or die"). Karim believes in Janai as queen, and treats her as such, and even when he is pushing for his own rule, it is doing so in subsequent open service to Sol Regem and then Aaravos as greater authorities ("What would you have me do? Where would you have me go?" / "You pushed me to this, sister"). The elves who don't, or aren't, usually have more human influence on their lives: Amaya and Ezran with Janai; Callum, Ezran, and Amaya with Rayla, etc.

But the stars kept from them one secret still: that their first lesson—patience—was not a gift of the stars at all. You see, patience is a lesson the humans taught themselves. [...] But I have heard the lesson of the humans. I know patience well.

And this imagination to dream, build, create, to forge, to pursue with determination, makes them less predictable. They don't have arcanums: they don't have anything they intrinsically 'know' to shape them the way elves and magical creatures, and so they can know nothing; they can know anything, and that makes them much harder to control and look over, even for those who are Timeblind (as the Cosmic Council likely is). Especially since, per the apple, it seems that yes maybe Aaravos shared the gift of magic with humans by his own admission, and maybe helped to develop dark magic... but I do wonder if humans invented it, regardless. What Startouch elf would need self-eating, after all?

As a final point for this section: even Aaravos giving humans magic wasn't his idea. Humans likely saw Leola do primal magic and learned from it themselves > to her giving them enough to make a significant difference. Then Aaravos took what had already happened, then twisted and did it again. Moreover, Aaravos plots and plans and relies on people's predictability in order to manipulate them; he may hate the Cosmic Council, but he's still fundamentally acting like them, enforcing pre-determined destinies onto other characters, Sir Sparklepuff, Sol Regem, Viren, and his other pawns chief among them.

If humans are unique among Xadia for reasons beyond magic, then them rejecting the destiny of the stars, Aaravos included, is the ultimate way to write their own destiny and rewrite the system to be truly equitable (hi Callum with Aaravos' key and a literal leaning book of destiny?) and I think that's pretty cool.

A Detour: Aaravos' De-Powering

Back on the note of "the Cosmic Order and Council we see presented in S6 is not the way things always were" from before, I want to talk about Aaravos' de-powering. Specifically, both of them. Again, we tread into speculation territory here (because when do we not when it comes to the deep lore) but bear with me.

In the pre-S6 posters of him and his cube/book, Aaravos wears the same crown as the rest of the Cosmic Council. We don't know enough about Startouch elves to know if they all wear them, or just the Cosmic Council, or if every Startouch elf besides Aaravos is on the council anyway, with his classic bangles and even fancier outfit.

But by the time we see Aaravos in S6, he doesn't have his crown. This could be something he relinquished by choice, a side effect of residing on earth (though he has no trouble going to the 'council' room for lack of a better term), or otherwise stripped from him. This could be what made him less powerful than the rest of the council.

We know that the Cosmic Council didn't leave right away after primal magic was given, either. It was only when Elarion had grown from a fledging to a thriving city thanks to primal magic, and the dragons seemingly took issue, that the Stars left and Aaravos remained. We don't know why for either choice, beyond Aaravos wanting to stay and 'help' humanity (ie. get closer to the Great Unravelling):

Elarion, unworthy whelp, Wept as the stars turned black the sky, They donned their masks They turned their backs, And left Elarion to die. Elarion, dying husk, did wilt and whimper in the dark, ‘till the last star Reached from afar His touch: a blaze, a gift, a spark.

But as @kradogsrats pointed out, perhaps the Cosmic Council left because they were afraid. We see time and time again that fear, when listened to, is a turning point for people leaving: Soren ("I don't want to do this. I'm afraid"), Rayla (afraid of what Viren might do to the world and Callum), Lissa ("she was afraid, she said no"), Terry (of becoming someone he's not), and of more isolationist behaviour. Janai becomes demanding in 6x02 ("Take your masks off, I want to see what you are truly feeling. You are... afraid?"), asks Karim "what are you so afraid of?" in 4x02, to which he responds with permanent integration. And others who overrule fear — "Of course he was afraid, but you had a job to do!" / "It won't follow because it's afraid of me" — being antagonistic because of it.

Aaravos — who the other First Elves at least trusted — doing / becoming something awful, which causes them to turn and run. Maybe they're more de-powered than we think (we are assuming, after all, that they're at the full height of their abilities and can kill him, neither of which may be necessarily true). Aaravos states in 'Patience' that "I have not seen the stars in centuries. But when I see them again—when the stars are forced to look upon me, their dark brother" and the Epic of the Void poem in Tales of Xadia ponders:

Where do the fabled Great Ones hide? What secrets have you locked inside? [...] Of Starfolk, fabled, fallen, found— Once everywhere, now none around. Is all we are to know of thee Consumed by Dark, or cast to Sea? So bound to Earth, are we denied The touch of Stars? Have our Gods died? Where do the fabled Great Ones hide?

So, seemingly, there was the removal of Aaravos from the council, then something that made him be 'Fallen,' and that includes why he can't just access the First Elves wherever they are now the way he could before. With all this in mind, onto the 'conclusion'.

So What's the Point?

Quick timeline run down:

5,000 years ago: First Elves and 'ordinary' elves are separate. There are Archdragons and humans. Only First elves and archdragons, presumably, have magic.

3000 years ago: Laurelion and Shiruakh have their battle. More fighting between the archdragons and first elves may be ongoing. Humans forge the Nova Blade and presumably the scale armour.

Between 3000 and 2000 years ago: Primal elves are made distinctive. Aaravos is higher up in Startouch 'society'? First elves are more regularly walking around on the mortal plain. Aaravos has his first de-powering. Leola gives humans magic and is executed. Anak Araw is the Dragon Prince and Aaravos' goal of vengeance is born.

2000 years ago: Elarion is thriving under primal magic with humanity. Dragons (and possibly first elves) don't like it. The First Elves leave (ish). Sometime in the next 800 years Aaravos robs the Starscraper, taking a singular staff and a quasar diamond and gives humanity dark magic.

1200 years ago: Sol Regem is Dragon King. The Staff of Ziard is gifted, sowing chaos. Stand off with Ziard happens.

1000 years ago: Luna Tenebris is the Dragon Queen. Humanity is exiled to the west under the Judgement of the Half Moon, potentially after poaching all the unicorns. The Mage Wars happen, with the Staff passing through many hands, with Xadia not stepping in to stop any of it.

300 years ago: Luna Tenebris is murdered, throwing the archdragons into a succession crisis. Queen Aditi mysteriously vanishes (aka is eaten by Aaravos) before she can resolve it. The Mage Wars end (?) possibly because of Aaravos' imprisonment thanks to the Orphan Queen. She acquires the Key of Aaravos and passes it down her new royal line; the Jailer presumably keeps the staff and passes it down her occupational line of high mage of Katolis.

The one wiggling thought is that Ziard states that "One of the great ones" gave him the staff in 3x01, implying that more than just Aaravos are still around, but Sol Regem being pissed does imply that he knew it was Aaravos directly. Speaking of Sol Regem, I get the sense that he knew more than he was letting on, given that he tattled on Leola, hated humans but grew much more bitter as he progressed towards modern day (no more offers of mercy or bargaining), and his distaste for Aaravos despite not being involved in imprisoning him with the other Archdragons. The fact that he has the bleakest view on Xadia ("You think I can reign and fix what is broken in Xadia? No one can save it") and is the one Archdragon we know was canonically old enough to be contemporaries with the First Elves does not help matters, either.

I suppose what this all amounts to is that, with both the Archdragons and humanity (allied or not), First Elves faced a lot more conflict on the mortal plain than maybe first considered, before things evened out to something more stable and reverent. Humans were made to be distinct from primal elves on purpose, but in a flawed manner (i.e. they can connect to arcanums Anyway), possibly in a way that inspired Aaravos to do the same if he wasn't inherently connected (which is perhaps what his book used to be as a conduit). First Elves might've left because they were freaking terrified, and not necessarily just indifferent.

Meanwhile, the more you look at humans, the more they're beautiful freaks of nature within Xadia, and while they've undoubtedly done fucked up things in pursuit of magic and power/protection, we know Aaravos stoked the Mage Wars, and it also wouldn't surprise me if certain facts (like the unicorn extinction) was the responsibility of other parties in Xadia in congruence, rather than just on their shoulders. Unreliable narrators and all that + even when they were present, the Cosmic Council seemingly wasn't doing much, relying on Sol Regem both to report to them and to serve as a witness, and then doing fuck all about Aaravos when shit actually hit the fan. Maybe Aaravos and his quasi-human army hyped on primal magic freaked them out.

Uh. Thoughts?

#tdp #tdp meta #the dragon prince #analysis series #deep lore dive #worldbuilding #analysis #i wrote this all in one day don't look at me #s7 spoilers

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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 1 year ago

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When The World Is Crashing Down [Chapter 1: Am I More Than You Bargained For Yet]

Series summary: Your family is House Celtigar, one of Rhaenyra's wealthiest allies. In the aftermath of Rook's Rest, Aemond unknowingly conscripts you to save his brother's life. Now you are in the lair of the enemy, but your loyalties are quickly shifting...

Chapter warnings: Language, warfare, violence, serious injury, a brief history of burn treatments, alcoholism/addiction, references to sexual content (18+), a wild Sunfyre appears, catching feelings for literally the single most inappropriate man on the planet.

Series title is a lyric from: "7 Minutes in Heaven" by Fall Out Boy.

Chapter title is a lyric from: "Sugar, We're Goin' Down" by Fall Out Boy.

Word count: 5.3k.

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

💜 I’m going to tag like a bazillion people since this is the first chapter of a new fic, but I WILL NOT TAG YOU AGAIN unless you ask me to. I hope you are all doing well, wherever you are in the world! 💜

@doingfondue @catalina-howard @randomdragonfires @myspotofcraziness @arcielee @fan-goddess @talesofoldandnew @marvelescvpe @tinykryptonitewerewolf @mariahossain @chainsawsangel @darkenchantress @not-a-glad-gladiator @gemini-mama @trifoliumviridi @herfantasyworldd @babyblue711 @namelesslosers @thelittleswanao3 @daenysx @moonlightfoxx @libroparaiso @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics @mizfortuna @florent1s @heimtathurs @bhanclegane @poohxlove @narwhal-swimmingintheocean @heavenly1927 @echos-muses @padfooteyes @minttea07 @queenofshinigamis @juliavilu1 @amiraisgoingthruit @lauraneedstochill @wintrr13 @r0segard3n @seabasscevans @tsujifreya @helaenaluvr @hiraethrhapsody @backyardfolklore

Let me know if you’d like to be tagged in future chapters!

You scream when he grabs you, this lightning strike of a man with a grip like an animal trap that splits bones. He pulls you away from the soldier you’re soothing—a young dark-haired Norcross, disoriented, doomed, his intestines spilling out onto the grass and blood on his lips—and through the forest of smoke and corpses and pine trees. Your eyes sting and water, your boots snag on gnarled roots. When you yelp and stumble to the earth, the man drags you upright again. You struggle like a beast with a blade at its throat, cold, serrated, pressure on the jugular. You shove and scratch at him, trying to plant your boots in soil strewn with gore and glowing embers.

“Stop, stop it, you’re hurting me!”

“Hurry up.”

“You’re going to break my wrist—!”

He wrenches you around to look you full in the face, and only now do you know who he is. A gasp hisses through your teeth; the acrid air in your lungs vanishes. Every muscle and tendon and ligament of you is taut with horror, tight enough to snap. It’s like meeting one of the Seven, the Warrior or Stranger or Smith, a shade you know only from myths and nightmares. It’s like being led to the executioner’s scaffold. His long silver braid hangs over one shoulder. His eyepatch conceals the childhood maiming that left him half-blind. There’s blood and ash on his scarred face, a ruthless breed of fear in his remaining eye, icy blue, creek-shallow, soulless. The man clasping your wrist is Prince Aemond Targaryen. “I’ll break your neck if you don’t come with me now.”

He does not wait for your protest or acquiescence. You couldn’t give it anyway. Your muddied boots move numbly as he tugs you forward, this man they call Aemond One-Eye, a monster, a murderer, a kinslayer. The earth is littered with carnage from the battle, charred ribcages and disemboweled horses, scattered armor and severed limbs. Ashes fall from the smoldering treetops like dark snow.

What does he want from me?

Rape seems unlikely; everyone knows Prince Aemond’s deviancies do not run in that direction. He is cold, hateful, dispassionate, made of stone. He does not lust for anything but power and retribution, fire and blood.

To kill me?

But why not do it here, now? There is a sword hanging from his belt, a dagger in one fist. There is no reason to wait.

To take me prisoner? To feed me to his dragon? To torture me for information?

Surely there are more knowledgeable people around to torture. What use could you be, a healer, a woman? Unless…

Unless he knows who my father is.

You glance down at the fabric band looped around the upper half of your right arm, the only mark you wear of your house, stark white banner, skittering red crabs. It is soaked through with blood. It is unreadable.

Someone is shrieking, but not like a dying man. He has too much fight in him for that, too much glass-clear agony, unwanted blistering consciousness. He screams like someone being flayed, gutted, burned alive. You’ve only ever heard this sound once before. You choke on the greasy, putrid, metallic sweetness of scorched human flesh as it sears down your throat, not knowing if it is real or remembered.

There is a tent in the midst of the pine trees, fluttering canvas that’s green like emeralds or jade. The wind is picking up; you will need to evacuate soon. The cinders will spread and the forest will blaze. Somewhere a dragon is roaring, wounded and mournful like the cry of a lost child. The screams of the man grow louder; they fill your skull like a fever, scalding and senseless and red. Aemond yanks the tent flap aside and pulls you in. And when you breathe it is nothing but the sickening miasma of burnt flesh, coppery blood, suffering, sweat, ruin.

He’s writhing on a wooden table, the man the Greens call king. It has to be him: white-blond hair down to his shoulders, blue eyes and fine aristocratic bones. Two ancient, shaky-handed maesters—hastily commandeered from the defeated House Staunton, you assume—confer nearby, clutching glass bottles of milk of the poppy. A man in armor is cutting tatters of clothing from the so-called king. When he lifts the fabric away, skin sloughs off with it. Aegon wails, struggles, begs him to stop. Aemond goes to his brother and carves away scraps of melted leather and charred cotton with the swift blade of his dagger.

“Shh, shh, don’t fight us, we’re trying to help—”

“Aemond, let me die,” the burned man rasps. He is trembling violently, he is half-mad with pain. Meleys’ flames claimed a swath of his right cheek, his neck and chest and back, his arms down to his wrists, his belly to the crests of his hip bones. “Please. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want it to hurt anymore. Don’t try to help me. Just let me die.”

Aemond looks back at you. “Can you treat this?”

He thinks I’m a Green, you realize with panic, with relief, with terror. And of course he would: you had wandered into the Greens’ side of the battlefield and therefore did not surrender or flee or die with the other Blacks, you were tending to a Green soldier when he found you. Aemond the Kinslayer would not comprehend the notion of service to humankind without a line drawn down the middle of it, of uncategorical compassion.

“Can you help him or not?!” Aemond shouts; and you know that he is not just afraid but shattering, spider-leg cracks inching across a window or a mirror. Perhaps the Greens have souls after all.

You shed your paralysis like daylight erases the stars and approach to examine the so-called king. You do not touch him; still, he whimpers, sobs, quakes like waves in a storm. “He needs more milk of the poppy. A lot more of it.”

“Yes,” Aegon agrees immediately. His streaming eyes—a bleak, murky blue like the sea off Claw Isle—list to you, agonized and grateful.

The maesters gape. “More could kill him,” one says. And they are petrified of being blamed for it. They are plagued by visions of Aemond hacking off their heads and displaying them on spikes above the stone walls of captured Rook’s Rest.

“No drawbacks at all then?” Aegon manages between moans.

“If his pain does not abate, he will die of shock,” you say. “He must be unconscious.”

“Knock me out,” Aegon pleads, pawing at Aemond. “Tell them, tell them.”

Aemond looks to the man in armor: dark-haired, olive-skinned, Dornish. Sir Criston Cole, you realize. The Hand of the King. The Kingmaker. After a moment, Criston nods. “Do it now,” Aemond orders the maesters.

Grimacing, grim, they pour the opalescent liquid into Aegon’s mouth. He gulps it down as quickly as he can. “Enough,” you tell the maesters. Instinctively, you reach out to comfort Aegon: a palm rested lightly on his forehead, fingers threaded through silvery hair that’s filthy with soot and blood. You should hate him, but you don’t. When you look at the Greens’ broken king, you cannot see a murderer, a usurper, a depraved hedonist, a consumer of innocence. You can only see a man worn threadbare by ill-advised bravery.

“Hello, angel,” Aegon murmurs as he gazes up at you, a ghost of a smile on his lips. His eyes really do remind you of home: ocean currents like iron, fog like flint. “Welcome to the end of the world.” And then he’s out, extinguished, eclipsed.

Servants bustle into the tent carrying heavy buckets. “What is that?” you ask.

“Pork lard,” one of the maesters says. “For his wounds.”

“No, no, no, some of these burns are nearly down to the muscle. They’re too deep, too fresh. Lard is for later, to help with scarring, although olive oil or rose oil would be better. He needs to be cleaned with vinegar diluted with water. Or red wine, if that’s all that can be found.”

“Vinegar?!” one of the maesters exclaims.

“It helps prevent infection. Nobody knows why.”

The same maester turns to Aemond, imploring him. “My prince, I can assure you, the Citadel recommends pork lard or cow dung as topical cures, or both used alternatingly. There are also reports of cases where frogs have been helpful, warmed in oil and then rubbed on the affected area.”

Criston blinks. “I’m sorry, you do what with the frogs…?!”

They’re going to kill him, you think. Not with malice, but with stupidity. A wasted life, a wasted death. You demand of the maester: “When was the last time you treated burns this severe?”

He glowers at you, sharp dark eyes like flecks of onyx in a nest of wrinkles. And you know you’ve won when he replies: “When have you?”

“My brother was burned in a housefire started by an upturned lantern. It was five years ago, but I remember the direness his injuries. And what was done to save him.”

Silence in this tent the color of summer: green grass, unsinged trees. Aemond waits for the maesters to produce some astute rebuttal. When they cannot, he orders the servants: “Vinegar, water, rags. Now.” They dash off to oblige him, wide-eyed and quivering like small dogs. Then Aemond looks to you. “What next?”

“His wounds should be treated with honey and then bandaged. The dressings must be changed frequently, at least once per day. He must be repositioned so the scar tissue does not immobilize his joints. He will suffer, it cannot be avoided, but he should suffer as little as possible. Listen to him when he says the pain is too much. Let him sleep. When he is awake, he must drink plenty of fluids. He is losing water through his burns, and it must be replaced. Milk is preferable. Tea and fruit juices are good as well. Some wine is acceptable if that’s what he likes best.”

“And it certainly is,” Criston mutters. You’ve heard the same: that the Greens’ king is a drunk, an adulterer, a coward, a ghoul. You cannot speak to any of this. You know him only as someone who is horrifically pained and sick to death of fighting. Again, without thinking, you comb your fingertips distractedly through his hair as he lies unconscious on the table, bleeding from everywhere. He’s so young, so breakable, so unlike the monster you’ve been led to believe he is.

“Get honey and bandages,” Aemond tells the maesters. They depart, casting each other incredulous glances: Are these our new overlords? Men who heed the wisdom of impetuous young women filthy with blood and earth?

“I’ve heard salt can be helpful for wounds,” Aemond says. “They used it on me when…” He gestures to his eyepatch, to his scar. Lucerys Velaryon took that part of him in self-defense; at least, that is what you have always been told. But you’ve read enough to know that for every event, there are at least two stories. Whatever the truth is, Luke paid for that eye. He paid, Rhaenyra paid, the world continues to pay the price over and over again.

“Because it dries. It absorbs moisture.” You skim your palm over Aegon’s forehead, without lines of fear or anguish as he sleeps. There is a ring on his left hand, a gold dragon with glinting dots of jade for eyes. You twist off the ring so it will not hinder circulation as his fingers swell and give it to Aemond. “But burns weep as they heal. They need to be wet. If they get too dry, they will crack open and fester.”

“Is that what happened to your brother?” Aemond asks.

“Where we did not pay enough attention. The backs of his knees, the soles of his feet.”

“But he survived.”

“Yes,” you tell Aemond; and you can see how desperately he is searching for hope in your face, your words. “He did.”

The servants return with buckets of water, handfuls of rags, glass bottles of vinegar that is cloudy and rust-colored.

“What’s it made from?” you say.

“Fermented a-a-apples, my lady,” one of the boys sputters. He watches Aemond out of the corner of his eye like sheep look for the shadows of wolves. He shivers, he sweats. This boy, who last night was fetching meat and mead for Lord Staunton, has heard the same stories you have: the degenerate king, his murderous brother.

“That’s fine then.” You haul over one of the water buckets and Criston helps you lift it up onto the table. You empty half a bottle of vinegar into the water, mix it by wobbling the bucket back and forth, and then soak a rag in the pungent liquid. “You can help,” you tell Aemond and Criston. “Dip a rag in the bucket, wring it out, then press it to his wounds. Remove any dirt or scraps of fabric. But don’t rub. Try not to damage the skin he has left.” You demonstrate: dabbing at flesh that is torn and bloody and blistered, a black-and-ruby wasteland that at best will leave him irreparably scarred and at worst will swallow his life like ships sink in storms.

Tentatively—with hands at ease with killing but not tenderness—Aemond and Criston join you, studying your movements and imitating them with great care. There is a sniffle, a teardrop that falls onto Aegon’s filthy but unburned left hand and glistens there like a splinter of glass; you are alarmed to see that the Kingmaker is weeping.

“Criston,” Aemond says gently. “We are doing everything we can for him.”

“Since the day he was born, I promised…��

“I know.”

“Your mother…”

“I know,” Aemond says again, and you think: The Greens aren’t demons, they aren’t savages. They’re just patchworks of memory and flesh and suffering, the same as any of us. “He will live. And his sacrifice won us a victory today.”

As you tended to wounded men caked with blood and pine needles, you saw them tangled above in the overcast sky, scales of scarlet and gold and an ancient muddy viridescence. There were flames and shouts, and then all three dragons hurdled towards the earth and out of view. “The Red Queen?” you ask Aemond, mindful to keep your voice perfectly level.

“Dead,” he says: dark satisfaction, fearsome pride. “And so is her rider.”

“The gods are good.” You are amazed at how easily it slips out, a reflex of self-preservation while your mind is elsewhere. Does my father know yet? Does Rhaenyra, does Daemon, does Corlys? People will be searching for you soon. If you do not appear from the smoke and chaos of the battlefield, your eldest brother Clement will come looking with his sword in hand. Everett, scarred and unagile but clever, will be pouring over maps to see where you might have ended up.

There is no suspicion in Aemond’s face when he glances over at you. He is gingerly cleaning soot and charred strips of ruined skin from Aegon’s chest, which rises and falls in deep, slow breaths. “Which family is yours?”

House Celtigar, but you can’t tell him that. You scramble for a noble family of the Crownlands whose accent you share, whose history you have been taught, whose men fight for the Greens but are not so distinguished that Aemond will know them well. “House Thorne.”

He nods. “Are you one of Sir Rickard’s sisters?”

You startle. Perhaps you have chosen the wrong disguise. “Far less illustrious than that. Just a cousin.”

The two maesters return, their archaic hands piled high with linen bandages and glass jars of honey, a fiery gold like sunset. “Set them down over there,” Aemond orders, pointing. He has a presence, it cannot be denied. He is tall, fierce, swift yet calculated. He moves like a man who has killed once, twice, again until it is no longer something that keeps him awake at night. It is something that has become a part of him like arteries or bones. “Prepare a room in the castle.”

“For Prince Aegon?” one of the maesters says, then quickly corrects himself. “I mean, for the king?”

“For until we decide what to do with him.” Aemond stares at Criston. Criston stares back, his dark eyes huge and shiny. There is a war to be waged, but Aegon will not be able to help them. Not for months, at least. Not ever, if he dies. The maesters disappear again, grumbling to each other. Unwelcome tasks, unwelcome guests.

Rhaenys is dead, you think as you work. It doesn’t feel real. Meleys is dead. Hundreds of Black soldiers are dead. Rook’s Rest is the Greens’ greatest victory yet, and one they desperately needed. This war is nowhere near over. And the betting odds keep changing.

You say to Aemond and Criston: “Help me turn him. We must clean the burns on his back as well.”

They listen, they obey, they help you because helping you means helping Aegon. When he is washed as well as he can be, you spread a thin sheen of shimmering honey over his wounds—an amber river that will trap moisture and discourage inflammation—and wrap him in bandages. The only burn you leave uncovered is the one on his right cheek. It creeps up over his pale face like red tentacles, curling and grasping, hungry, insatiable. They match now, you think. Two brothers, two scars.

Criston assembles a group of Green soldiers and Aegon is carried in a litter to the castle that serves as the seat of House Staunton, once allies of Rhaenyra, now traitors, now dead men walking. Outside rain has begun to fall, putting out flames born from dragonfire. The pine forest is saved; wounded men lie in the dirt with their mouths open hoping to quench their thirst. By the time Aegon is placed in an opulent bedroom with a view of Blackwater Bay, he has already bled through his bandages. You clean him again, bandage him, dribble milk of the poppy down his throat when he begins to stir and whimper. Aemond gives you command of a makeshift fleet of caretakers: the two requisitioned maesters, three maids, servants to bring food, drink, bandages, wood for the crackling fireplace.

My family is searching for me, you know as you battle to save their enemy’s life, this maybe-king with silver hair and eyes like deep water.And then: I cannot leave him. Not now, not yet.

In the night, as cool rain patters against the ocean and Aemond and Criston are slaughtering House Staunton men down in the castle courtyard, you dose Aegon with milk of the poppy every few hours. The maesters refuse to take responsibility for it; if the king is poisoned, it will be you who swings from a rope for it. You hold cloths dripping with cold water to his forehead. You feed him nibbles of bread and venison when he is conscious enough to eat, cinnamon tea, pomegranate juice, goat milk. You inspect him for any signs of infection. You braid a small lock of his hair before you’ve stopped to consider why you’re doing it.

And when no one else is watching, you untie the bloodstained armband of your own house and burn it to ashes in the fire.

~~~~~~~~~~

Someone is jostling you, grabbing at you. You fell into an exhausted, sporadic sleep in the next room long after midnight. It’s morning now; warm sunlight blooms like flowers on your face, yellow roses and buttercups and daffodils. When your eyes open, they are sore and unfocused. Aemond is a blur of white hair and black leather. He is tugging on you again, his lithe fingers like a vice around your forearm.

“Stop it, get off me!” You shove him away. He waits, bemused. “You can’t keep dragging me around like this!”

“Why not?”

Because my father is one of the wealthiest men in the Seven Kingdoms. Because I may not have silver hair or a dragon, but if you cut me open the blood of Old Valyria would spill out like red waves. Because the man I am pledged to marry is good at killing, very good at killing, maybe even better than you. “Because I’m a noblewoman. I’m a lady.”

“You don’t act like one,” Aemond counters. “Ladies flee from blood and gore. Ladies are nowhere to be found on battlefields.”

“I like being useful.”

“Then I have brought you a gift. You are needed now. Aegon is asking for you.” And then, when you hurry out of bed, finding your footing on chilly wood floors: “Well, that certainly got you moving quickly.”

“He’s in pain?”

“Not especially, from what I can tell. I think he just wants you.” Aemond glides out of the bedroom. You follow him to Aegon’s chamber. The Greens’ king is propped up in bed on a great mass of pillows, bandaged, limp, eyes glazed and barely open. There are men huddled around him. You recognize Criston, though not the other ones, some old and some young and all in armor. You hope that none of them are Sir Rickard Thorne.

You feel Aegon’s forehead for fever. To your relief, he is no more than modestly warm. He catches your hand, holds it tightly, doesn’t let go. After a moment’s hesitation, you sit down beside him on the edge of the bed. There is a curl of his lips, just a whisper of a smile, just a phantom of one. Aemond glances at you and Aegon with mild interest, then turns his attention to Criston.

“Aegon,” Criston informs the king, patiently, like a good father would. “We have to move you back to King’s Landing.”

“No,” Aegon says. His voice is so low and weak that he’s difficult to hear.

“Your recovery will be long and arduous,” Criston explains. “Aemond and I will be needed in combat. We cannot stay to guard you. The Blacks may try to retake Rook’s Rest. You staying here is not an option. King’s Landing is safer. It is well-supplied, it is protected. And we have our own maesters there who will help tend to you.”

“Can’t leave,” Aegon croaks. “Sunfyre.”

“Aegon—”

“I can’t leave without Sunfyre,” he forces out with immense effort. Then he gasps and moans, tears pooling in his eyes. You offer him milk of the poppy; he guzzles as much as you’ll allow him to have.

Criston sighs. “You can’t stay. And Sunfyre can’t leave. One of his wings was nearly ripped off, he’ll never fly again. We have no way to transport him, he’s too heavy.”

One of the armored men mutters: “And that’s assuming he wouldn’t incinerate anyone who ventured close enough to try.”

“Where is he now?” Aemond asks the man.

“Down on the beach, my prince. Eating dead soldiers.”

Criston shudders. Working in close proximity to dragons has not given him a liking for them.

“Can’t leave him here,” Aegon whispers, shaking his head.

“You must,” Aemond says.

“What if it was Vhagar?”

“I’d leave her. I’d have no choice.”

Aegon frowns, squeezing his eyes shut. It’s all too much for him. “Not the same.”

No, perhaps not; Aemond’s dragon may be the largest and most lethal in the world, but Aegon’s bond with Sunfyre is said to be what legends are built of, words written in ink and stone. You watch the agonized confliction on Aegon’s drawn face: can’t leave, can’t stay, can’t fight, can’t run. You say softly: “Could Sunfyre be assigned a detachment of guards?”

Aemond looks at you as if just remembering you’re here. “What?”

“Men could be tasked with ensuring the dragon is secure and fed. From a safe distance, of course. They could report on his health. Then perhaps when he is stronger, he can be reunited with the king.” The king. Again, it stuns you how easily the treason rolls out, like waves bubbling over rocks and sand.

Aemond turns to Criston. “Could it be done?”

“I don’t foresee many men volunteering for the task. But it could be done, yes. Sure.”

Aemond asks his brother: “Would that make a difference?”

Aegon’s eyes drift to you. They are churning with sluggish, clunky thoughts, heavy burdens to bear on raw shoulders. The braid that you wove absentmindedly into his hair is still there. “Alright,” Aegon agrees at last. “I’ll go.”

“Good,” Aemond says. “We leave at dawn tomorrow.” Then he looks to you. “You will come south with us.” His tone invites no argument. He doesn’t even conceive of it as a possibility. Why would you refuse? Why would you, a purportedly devout Green, shy away from the opportunity to nurse your king back to health? You bow your head in compliance. You wonder what is being discussed in the Black Council; you wonder what your father is thinking, what Everett believes happened to you.

“But I have to see him first,” Aegon says.

Aemond does not understand. “See who?”

“Sunfyre.”

“But you can’t walk to the beach,” Criston says. “You can’t walk anywhere.”

Aegon grins, showing his teeth. His dazed, deep blue eyes glitter mischieviously. His hand has not disentangled itself from yours. “Then carry me.”

The deal is struck, like a face minted onto a coin or a bolt of lightning meeting the earth. Soldiers transport Aegon down to the stony, mist-sopped shoreline. Blade-sharp agony is flooding back into his face, but he refuses more milk of the poppy. He wants to be awake when he gets there. He wants to be himself.

The soldiers cannot get too close to Sunfyre; no one besides Aegon can. He is helped off the litter and then tries to amble across the wet, grey sand. After a few steps he collapses. You rush to him, dodging Aemond and Criston’s grasps as they try to stop you.

“No,” Aegon says when you attempt to help him to his feet. He is panting from the pain, his face flushed with torment and exertion. His white-blond hair whips in the wind. “Do not follow me. Not even if I pass out, not even if I’m dead. I don’t know what Sunfyre would do to you.” And then he crawls forward alone on his hands and knees.

Waves crash, spraying saltwater into the air. Crabs scuttle over rocks. Gulls swoop low to claim mouthfuls of flesh from bloated corpses in worthless uniforms. The dragon known as Sunfyre the Golden is curled up on the beach. Many of his metallic scales are singed; the pink membranes of his wings are tattered like lace. His right wing hangs at a ruinously odd angle. You would know how to set that if he was a human. And you could do it without the threat of being reduced to ash and history.

Sunfyre unravels as Aegon nears him, long angular face rising, frayed wings settling by his sides. You have seen dragons before, of course—Syrax, Caraxes, Arrax, Vermax, Meleys—though never from this close. They horrify you. You cannot look at them without thinking of the devastation they sow like a plague, of how they so unmistakably no longer belong in this world.

Sunfyre’s head stretches out towards his rider, a half-dead man kneeling in wet sand and wearing only bandages and loose cotton trousers. Beside you, Sir Criston Cole sucks in a noisy, nervous breath. Aemond watches Aegon, his face like stone. His hair hangs in long, damp waves.

Aegon embraces Sunfyre, clinging to him, resting his face against the dragon’s. They stay like that for what feels like a very long time. Then Aegon crawls back to you, sobbing with pain by the time he is lifted into the litter. You give him milk of the poppy and he accepts it eagerly. He is unconscious again within seconds. Down the beach, Sunfyre looses a soft desolate cry like a plea: Don’t go. Don’t leave me. You might never come back.

~~~~~~~~~~

The drivers have been instructed to proceed slowly and with caution; still, the carriage pitches and jolts as you traverse the Rosby Road towards King’s Landing. In addition to the caravan’s most precious cargo—the Greens’ fragile and intermittently sentient king—it transports also two severed heads: Lord Simon Staunton’s in a basket, and Meleys’ in the bed of a mule-drawn wagon. High above in slate-grey clouds, Aemond and Vhagar are safeguarding your progress. Criston rides on a monstrous warhorse just outside the carriage. You are leafing through a book that you found in the castle library at Rook’s Rest: anatomy, surgery, sicknesses and cures. Aegon is bandaged and heavily medicated in the cushioned seat across from you. While servants flit in and out frequently, you are the only passengers in the carriage at the moment. You do not know that Aegon is awake until he speaks.

“Sinful,” he says. His voice is groggy, only half-here. He is gazing blearily at the illustration on the open pages of your book: a quite detailed naked man, his arteries and veins mapped like the roads of Westeros, his cock bare and sizeable.

“It’s informative,” you reply in your own defense, smiling.

“My father would have hit me for looking at something like that. If he’d noticed.” Aegon smirks, resting his head against the back of his velvet seat. His hair has been scrubbed and rinsed by servants, the braid you made for him undone. “He probably wouldn’t have noticed.”

“Mine has a great love for all books.” Bartimos Celtigar is eternally turning pages: computations, records, revenue. He does not just sit on Rhaenyra’s council. He is her Master of Coin. He funds her war effort, he fuels her like wood to a fire. “Besides, I have seen naked men in person. No book can scandalize me now.”

A little twitch of his silvery eyebrows: fascination, amusement. “He does not lose sleep over your spent innocence?”

“He has other things on his mind presently.”

“Like what?”

Like helping Rhaenyra win the war. You find a different truth to tell him. “Some men consider one daughter to be too many. My father has four. His attention is thoroughly divided.”

“He doesn’t like you?”

“He likes me plenty. He just doesn’t need me.”

Aegon nods. His eyes travel over you slowly and meditatively, not leering but learning, memorizing slopes and angles, taking you in like he’s never been able to before. He is in the brief lull between doses of milk of the poppy: lucid enough to speak but not so much that he can feel the full extent of his injuries. “Are you married?”

This is a bit of a fraught subject. “I am betrothed.”

“Oh,” he says, with what might be disappointment. “And he wouldn’t rather have you home right now? Putting all that knowledge of male anatomy to good use? That’s difficult to believe.”

You peer evasively down at your book. “He has a role to play in the war. I’ve been given permission to serve in my own way until it is over.”

“Permission,” Aegon echoes. He finds this interesting. He studies you for a while before he asks, his voice gentle: “What’s wrong with him?”

“Nothing. He’s honorable, he’s brave. He’s marvelously formidable. He could carry you around like a sack of potatoes.”

Aegon chuckles, a slow reflective laugh, curiosity, intrigue, something to think about besides the fact that he’s missing half his skin. “Do you fear marriage?”

What is the answer to that question? Do you even know yourself? “I fear being possessed. And having no remedy if the circumstances are not to my liking.”

“You can’t get one of your three superfluous sisters to marry him instead?”

You smile faintly. “No, we’ve met. He chose me, he favored me. I’m not sure why.”

“Probably because you’ve read all there is to know about cocks.” Aegon grins, drowsy and crooked and playful. “Who is he?”

“Just a man,” you say. You can’t tell Aegon more than that. It would give your Black affiliations away.

You are betrothed to the Warden of the North, Lord Cregan Stark.

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