Year 110 A.C.
POV: Denovan
And that was exactly my objective with Aemma Targaryen.
To completely disconnect her from the pain of the material world, shielding her soul in my mental refuge so that the maesters could tear open her womb and rip out the child with precision. She would be oblivious to the cut, the agony, and her own spilled blood. And when I noticed, watching stealthily through Heimdall's vigilant eyes, that the brutality had ended, I would simply dissolve the link, returning her safely to her body in the process of runic healing.
Gradually, my thread touched her mind and, with a strong mental pulse, I pulled Aemma's consciousness to me.
POV: Aemma Targaryen (née Arryn)
One moment, I saw the maesters moving hurriedly around my bed, and the next, I found myself standing in a dark hall. I could barely see anything; the farthest I could see were my own feet. This time, I was barefoot, without the socks Viserys had put on at that barbarian's request.
"Is this hell or the afterlife?" I muttered softly, feeling a chill down my spine.
"It is nothing of the sort, you are still very much alive, my queen," said the barbarian, sounding not too far from me.
Gradually, my eyes adjusted to the lighting and I could see the surrounding environment. I seemed to be in the center of an immense hall. The carpets were woven in shades of black and gold, while other corners displayed metals and silks in a deep blue. Statues of various beasts were scattered around different parts of the hall; they showed only the heads of the creatures and no two were alike, appearing to watch over the place.
I looked slightly up at the ceiling and what I saw, despite the ambient brightness, left me completely confused: a dazzling night sky, filled with bright stars.
I turned my eyes forward and found the barbarian sorcerer.
"Where have you brought me?"
POV: Denovan
After training and focusing enough, I could mold my mental space however I wanted.
A beach, a meadow, a castle hall, or even what I imagined heaven or hell to be; anything that crossed my mind took shape almost instantly. Melika had found it fascinating. Through this space, I had shown her the hot sands of Dorne, the high walls of the Red Keep, and the isolated Valley of Thenn. Her reactions were very amusing; her smile was extremely pleasant to see. I would have to take her to those places in person someday.
Looking at the queen, who seemed visibly frightened, I said:
"This is what I call the Mental World..." I said, spreading my arms to present the place.
"This is a world in which I have total mastery. Anything that enters here is under my control, everything I imagine becomes real... But rest easy, I would never do anything bad to you," I said, sitting calmly on an extremely well-crafted throne. It was worthy of a great king and warrior, shaped in the best way I imagined a perfect seat for me to be.
Aemma looked at me with deep suspicion. I made a slight gesture with my hands and a cozy-looking chair, filled with pillows and soft fabrics, appeared out of nowhere, right behind her.
She gave a slight jump forward out of startle, looking confusingly back and forth between me and the newly created furniture.
"When we are here, we disconnect from the outside world. You won't feel any pain during the surgery, so please, make yourself comfortable."
She remained silent for a few moments. With a demeanor worthy of royalty, she mastered her own fear, sat in the armchair with grace, and said in a very serious tone:
"Since it's just the two of us here... why don't you tell me your true goal with all this?" Her voice sounded polite and curious, but, looking deep into her eyes, it was possible to see that she wasn't calm in the slightest.
I looked deeply into her eyes, weighing how much I should reveal, and sighed.
"It's going to be a long story, my queen... I haven't even told your husband everything. You will probably call me a madman... but this is the truth. And it is a future that will no longer happen... because of my interventions."
Aemma remained silent, gripping the arms of the chair, and simply nodded for me to proceed.
"You were supposed to have died about three years ago... Maybe a little more, a little less, the dates blur in my mind..."
"You would die in a childbed... torn in half so they could take your baby... in the exact same way it is happening in the physical world right now."
"Hmph... Very easy for you to make up something like that..." she retorted, her voice trembling.
"Let me finish, Aemma... If you do not want to hear the truth, I will stop right here."
Her eyes flared in irritation, but her regal posture prevailed. She replied in a restrained manner:
"Continue."
"The king would find himself completely lost and destroyed without his wife and without his newborn, who would die hours later. Daemon, drunk in a brothel, would mock your dead son, calling him 'The Heir for a Day'. This would reach the king's ears. Daemon would be disinherited by Viserys, and then... everything would begin to crumble."
"The Hightowers would take advantage of the king's vulnerability to make your husband marry Alicent."
"He would never do that!" she exclaimed, her indignation breaking her politeness.
"I do not lie. Viserys would be under immense pressure from the small council to produce a new male heir. He would yield to those desires, marry Alicent, and she would give him children, the so-called 'Greens'."
"But even after that, Viserys would break the expectations of all the lords and continue to declare Rhaenyra as his sole and legitimate heir, and so it would be until the end of his days."
"On the day your husband died, Alicent's male son would be declared king behind the princess's back. And there would begin the most tragic history of House Targaryen. The family would be divided between the Blacks and the Greens, and a 'Dance of the Dragons' would sweep across the Seven Kingdoms, destroying you from the inside out. The world, which already possesses little magic, would suffer the final blow. A little more than three decades after this war, there would not be a single dragonrider in your house... The beasts would be extinct, killed by their own kin in the skies."
Aemma swallowed hard. Her initial firmness seemed to falter before the rawness of my words.
"And you think just keeping me alive will prevent all this horror from happening?"
"My goal isn't just to prevent the Dance from happening and ensure the dragons survive. My true goal is to ensure there are enough adult dragons to help the North when the time comes."
"When the time comes for what, exactly?" she asked, frowning.
"I don't even know for sure if it will happen ten years from now or two hundred years from now. My actions here might delay or hasten the end, which we call 'The Long Night'."
"The bedtime story that wet nurses tell disobedient children so they will sleep?" Aemma shook her head, skeptical.
"They are much more than ancient stories... My men and I have already fought the undead on the other side of the Wall. They are already active. I don't know when they will actually begin to march en masse to the South, but the White Walkers have already begun to move in the dark."
"I believe that as soon as we have a long summer, right afterward the world will plunge into the longest and most brutal of winters. And that is when they will advance to destroy the realm of men."
"Dragons are one of the only three things in the world that can kill them. The dead are immune to common steel, gold, or any other mundane weapon. Only Valyrian steel, dragonfire, and dragonglass can tear them apart."
"They are an immortal army. And worse: an army that will keep growing the more their enemies die. Every warrior the South and the North lose in the snow will be raised and added to their ranks."
"Without dozens of dragons burning the fields, do you think we will truly be able to defend the living? This is not a heroic song where good always wins. We don't even know how strong they really are. The Lands of Always Winter are unexplored. There could be ice castles, colossal beasts, and even undead dragons. It is simply impossible to defeat them with swords and shields alone."
"That is my first and greatest reason."
Aemma gave me a long and complex look. Terror was beginning to mix with disbelief.
"First? And what is the other?"
"The progress of my people. The North, especially the Far North where I come from, is brutal. The constant cold and starvation reap our families year after year. I just want them to have a decent life, and maintaining a good relationship with the ruler of Westeros is the most solid way to get the resources for that."
"Saving you is much more than just a petty interest for power. If my people are strong and well-fed, the more time the South will have to prepare for the coming of the Walkers. The North is your shield."
"Do you know how absurd this whole story sounds to a lady from the South? Do you really think I am just going to swallow and believe this?"
"You will," I said firmly.
I closed my eyes and dived into my densest memories, focusing on the day we faced that monster in the Haunted Forest.
Gradually, the entire mental hall began to tremble violently. The polished floor turned into hard earth, frozen and covered in thick snow. The ornate pillars and statues of beasts stretched, turning into massive, dark, twisted pine trees. The biting cold of the Far North invaded the air.
Aemma leaped up from her chair, her face contorted in genuine dread.
"What is this?!" she cried out in exasperation, her eyes fixed on the monstrosity that had just materialized in front of us.
An undead giant, covered in ice and putrefaction, rose from among the trees. And in the recreation of my memory, my younger self was there, fighting desperately for my life alongside Sig and Morn.
The titanic creature suffered small lacerations from the blows of our weapons, but even steel seemed ineffective against its ice-hardened skin and inexhaustible endurance.
"Throw fire! Only fire can stop it!"
My memory-self bellowed frantic orders while flaming arrows and torches were hurled at the monster's chest. My axe brutally struck the same leg whenever it found an opening. Sig tried to do the same, but she was constantly forced to roll in the snow so as not to be crushed by the beast's arms.
The simulation lasted as long as necessary for her to understand the scale of the threat. Only when the giant finally fell to the ground, reduced to charred bones smoldering in the snow, did I end the projection.
"This wasn't just an illusion to scare you. These are my exact memories of that event. There are dozens, perhaps hundreds of those things beyond the Wall. Did you see the immense effort and near sacrifice it took to kill just one of them?"
The scenery around us dissolved into silver smoke, and the royal hall formed again with its silks and statues.
"The size of our armies in the future won't matter. If we don't have the dragons' fire, we will all turn to ashes. The strength I build in the North will be of no use if the Targaryens aren't alive and united with their dragons to fight with us."
"So, make sure you take very good care of your son and raise him to be a strong king," I said, looking directly at her, who was breathing heavily.
"Was... was that really real?" she asked, her voice faltering as she took a hesitant step toward me.
"I would have absolutely no reason to make up something of this magnitude."
As soon as I finished the sentence, a clear image appeared in my mind through the connection with Heimdall: in the real world, the boy was crying at the top of his lungs in Viserys's trembling arms, while the maesters hurried with their needles to sew up the queen's torn womb. It was all over.
Before she could question the future again, I announced:
"Congratulations, Aemma. You have just given birth to a boy. And, judging by the deafening volume of his wail in the room out there, he seems to be doing fine."
The look that previously carried contemplation, confusion, and absolute terror, instantly softened. A smile of pure relief took over her face.
"Let me go back then... I need to see him."
"It is not time yet. We need to wait for the maesters to finish the stitches and for the body to pass through the initial shock. It will take a few hours for the healing runes to take true effect."
"But I want to see him," she insisted, her maternal tone overriding reason.
"You will feel excruciating pain right now if you wake up. Your physical body is already fragile and traumatized. It is much better that your mind is kept in absolute rest. At least let your vital signs stabilize with the magic."
"Two hours," she demanded anxiously, but the pride of a true queen was there. "And then you will let me return to my son."
I bowed slightly in a formal greeting and said:
"Your wish is my command, my queen."