In the tenth year of the Long Summer, a hint of coolness that did not belong to warmth could already be smelled in the air.
The sea was shrouded in a thin, milky-white mist, like a layer of flowing gauze, blurring the boundary between sky and sea.
The sun struggled behind the mist, revealing only a pale halo.
Old Ham cast his last net of the day, his rough hands skillfully tidying the wet netting ropes.
The net was heavy, carrying hope.
After a Long Summer must come a Long Winter, so the old folks said. And this summer had been unnaturally long, yet the recent winds were growing colder.
He needed more fish to dry into jerky and exchange for a few copper pennies to buy his granddaughter a thick wool coat.
The hearth at home also needed more firewood prepared.
He straightened his aching back, gave it a few thumps, squinted his dim old eyes, and habitually looked toward the horizon.
The mist was thick, and only the nearby undulating waves were visible.
At first, he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him.
At that gray junction of sea and sky, there seemed to be a deeper, heavier color, like ink dropped into water, slowly blurring and expanding.
He rubbed his eyes hard, leaned over the edge of the small boat, placed his palm over his brow, and strained to see.
It wasn't his eyes.
That smear of black was expanding and coalescing, changing from a blurry shadow into clear, densely packed... sails!
Sails! Countless sails, like a forest of black steel growing out of the seabed, were breaking through the mist and silently pressing toward Dragonstone!
Old Ham froze, his hand rubbing his eye stopping mid-air, his mouth hanging open unconsciously.
The chill did not come from the morning sea breeze, but surged up from the gaps in his spine, instantly freezing his blood.
Having fished his whole life, he had seen merchant ships, patrol galleys, and even caught distant glimpses of Iron Islands longships flying the golden kraken banner.
But never, never had he seen so many, such massive, and such silently oppressive silhouettes of sails.
They silently filled the eastern horizon like a slowly approaching black nightmare.
A short, strangled "Heh" escaped his throat, and the net rope slipped from his hands, falling into the damp cabin.
He spun around abruptly, used all his strength to grab the rough wooden oars, and rowed desperately toward the shore.
The small boat tossed violently in the waves, but he could care for nothing else. Only one thought remained in his mind: get back, tell the old woman, tell the villagers... no, tell the lords in the castle...
Something big has happened!
...
dragonstone, inside the Stone Drum Tower
The flames in the hearth flickered, emitting a drowsy warmth.
Selyse Florent knelt before a small altar covered with a thick rug, her hands clasped tightly to her chest, her knuckles white from the force.
She closed her eyes, her lips moving rapidly and silently in devout prayer to R'hllor... the lord of light.
Praying that everything would go well for her husband in the Stormlands, praying that he could defeat his rebellious brother Renly, praying that the True Lord's light would dispel the gloom over Westeros and place the promised throne into the hands of the truly legal and devout.
Not far behind her, Shireen Baratheon, her only daughter, sat quietly in a high-backed chair.
The girl was very small and thin, appearing even more frail wrapped in her heavy, dark dress.
Greyscale, like an ominous moss, covered most of the skin on her left cheek and spread toward her neck, appearing a dull stone-gray in the warm light of the hearth.
In those large blue eyes inherited from her father, there was none of the liveliness a child should have, only deep timidity, unease, and a dazed look at her mother's continuous prayers.
She didn't dare disturb her mother, only unconsciously wringing the hem of her skirt with her fingers.
"Queen! Queen Selyse!"
Hurried, panicked footsteps and shouts broke the silence of the room.
A guard wearing studded leather armor, his helmet not even properly fastened, practically crashed through the heavy oak door and rushed in, his face deathly pale and gasping for breath.
Selyse's prayer was interrupted; she frowned her meticulously groomed eyebrows in displeasure, opened her eyes, and looked at the intruder.
When she saw the unconcealed terror on the guard's face, her heart sank, but the poise of a noblewoman and the calm she had to maintain at this moment allowed her to suppress her unease.
"What is the panic!" she snapped, her voice sounding somewhat shrill as she deliberately raised it. "What has happened in the castle? Is it those blind pirates harassing the fishing villages again? Where is the Captain of the Guard?"
"No... not pirates, Queen!" The guard panted, incoherent. "Ships! So many ships! On the sea! To the east! Nothing but ships!"
"Ships?" Selyse stood up, clutching her skirts, her heart beating faster.
Renly? No, Renly's army was at Bitterbridge, to the southwest; how could they come from the sea to the east? Could it be... no, impossible.
"Did you see clearly? Is it a merchant Fleet? Or..."
"I couldn't see the banners, they're too far, and the mist is thick! But the numbers... there are too many! A black mass, there's no end in sight!" The guard's voice carried a sob. "Queen, most of the Soldiers in the castle were taken by King Stannis; the rest of us... what should we do?"
Shireen was frightened by this sudden chaos, shrinking tightly into her chair, her greyscale-covered cheek appearing even paler.
"Silence!" Selyse's voice grew even sharper, trying to mask her panic with anger. "Stannis is the rightful King of the Seven Kingdoms, protected by the lord of light, and will surely defeat all traitors!"
"Just some ships, perhaps a lost merchant Fleet, or bold pirates trying to take advantage of our weakness! Take me to the Dragonstone Tower immediately! Order all Soldiers to the walls and prepare for defense!"
As she spoke, she grabbed the trembling Shireen, practically dragging her daughter as she followed the guard out.
Her feigned calm orders and Shireen's suppressed, small sobs echoed in the corridor.
The Dragonstone Tower, the outermost tower of the Stone Drum Tower, served a defensive purpose.
The sea breeze became fierce here, carrying salty spray and a bone-chilling cold, blowing so hard one could barely stand.
Selyse gripped the cold stone of the crenellations tightly, her fingers losing color from the exertion.
Shireen was shielded behind her; the girl clutched her mother's skirt tightly, timidly peeking half her face out from behind her to look at the eastern sea.
The mist seemed to have cleared a bit.
Then, they saw it.
They saw that "blackness."
At first, it was indeed just an ominous dark smear on the horizon.
But as the distance closed, that blackness rapidly expanded and spread, eventually turning into a sea of sail silhouettes that swallowed the vision and brought despair.
Countless ships, some as large as moving castles, filled the entire eastern sea.
They were arranged in a neat, oppressive formation, silently breaking the waves as they came, like a black, mobile archipelago.
And on the mainmasts of the giant ships in the lead, the banners flying high were piercingly clear in the growing light.
A black field. Upon it, a ferocious three-headed dragon was embroidered with red silk thread.
Targaryen.
Selyse Florent felt a chill rush from the soles of her feet to the top of her head, instantly freezing her entire being, even her breathing stopped.
She had seen this banner in heraldry books and in the bloody history of the usurper's War that her husband Stannis occasionally mentioned.
This was the banner of the overthrown, exiled Dragonlord family.
How could it appear here? At Dragonstone, the former ancestral seat of the Targaryens, this island that now belonged to the Baratheons, to her husband Stannis?
"No... impossible..." she murmured vacantly, her voice trembling beyond recognition. "What... what is happening? How... how do they dare return?"
As if to answer her question, or rather, to completely crush the last sliver of hope in her heart...
The sky suddenly darkened.
It wasn't gathering storm clouds, but a deeper, more heart-palpitating shadow that enveloped the Dragonstone Tower, the castle, and the black Fleet before them.
A majestic, indescribable pressure descended from the sky. It wasn't the oppression before a storm, but the primal fear stemming from biological instinct brought by the arrival of a higher-level existence.
Everyone on the Dragonstone Tower—Selyse, Shireen, and the few guards—unconsciously looked up toward the sky as if pulled by invisible strings.
An unimaginably vast shadow slowly swept past at a low altitude.
It had a streamlined, massive body covered in pale gold scales that reflected a cold and divine metallic luster under the light piercing through the gaps in the clouds.
On three mountain-like heads, six molten-gold vertical pupils looked down indifferently at the tiny castle and humans below, golden lightning seemingly flowing within those pupils.
Each slow beat of the broad dragon wings kicked up a gale that made the tower tremble slightly.
A dragon.
A creature of legend. An existence that only lived in ancient songs, faded tapestries, and children's nightmares.
The symbol of the House Targaryen, the ultimate incarnation of power.
And now, it was right there.
Real, clear, carrying a soul-shivering majesty that crushed everything.
A short, muffled gasp came from behind Selyse.
It was Shireen.
The girl stared blankly up at the giant dragon in the sky, her blue eyes wide with extreme shock, her small mouth slightly open, even forgetting to cry or be afraid.
On her greyscale-covered cheek, there was only pure daze and shock at something that transcended her understanding.
Selyse did not hear her daughter's gasp.
All her senses, all her thoughts, were completely shattered and drowned by that existence in the sky, by that black dragon banner, and by that silent, boundless Fleet on the sea.
Her hand holding the crenellation slipped weakly, her body swayed, and she nearly collapsed. Only one frantic thought spun in her mind: Targaryen... and dragons... have returned. And Dragonstone is almost an undefended empty city.
It's over. Everything is over.
"Step, step, step..."
The sound of war boots treading on the ancient stone steps of the Stone Drum Tower was crisp and rhythmic, carrying a metallic clang that echoed through the empty corridors and halls.
This sound replaced the previous oppressive silence and occasional whispered prayers in the castle, announcing a change in power.
The battle... if it could even be called a battle.
At the moment Ghidorah appeared over Dragonstone, it was already over.
The morale of the few remaining garrison Soldiers instantly collapsed upon witnessing the dragon, seeing the despair-inducing Fleet on the sea, and hearing the dragon's roar that seemed to proclaim sovereignty.
A few symbolic arrows were fired weakly at the landing Soldiers, only to be immediately drowned by a fiercer rain of arrows and a swift assault.
Most of the guards, led by their officers, practically scrambled to lay down their weapons and kneel, begging for mercy.
There was no fierce resistance, no bloody beach landing.
dragonstone, this castle built of hard black stone that should have been easy to defend and hard to attack, was taken over almost without shedding a drop of blood.
Soldiers of the Ash Company in black cloaks and knights of the Bloodsworn in dark red cloaks quickly took control of the Stone Drum Tower, the city gates, the armory, the dungeons, and all other key positions.
They moved swiftly, silent and efficient, with only the friction of armor and short commands echoing in the castle.
Aegon walked at the very front.
Still in that light-swallowing, all-black valyrian steel armor, with a dark red cloak hanging behind him.
His visor was raised, revealing his calm, unruffled face. His silver hair fluttered slightly in the wind peculiar to sea fortresses, carrying salty moisture.
His steps were steady, his gaze slowly sweeping over the buildings along the way; everything here used to be filled with dragon elements, but most had been replaced under the Baratheon occupation, with only a few irreplaceable dragon-shaped archways remaining.
The main generals of the Bloodsworn and the Ash Company followed half a step behind him with their hands on their swords, their expressions solemn.
Finally, they arrived at the main hall of the Stone Drum Tower.
The heavy doors were slowly pushed open by the Soldiers on both sides, making a long, dull creaking sound.
Aegon was the first to enter.
Sunlight streamed through the high, narrow arched windows, forming pillars of light in the air where dust motes drifted.
The interior of the hall was vast and gloomy, the walls made of black dragonstone, cold and majestic.
The floor was paved with dark stone slabs.
At the end of the hall, atop several stone steps, sat the seat of the Lord of Dragonstone—a throne carved from a single piece of dark giant stone, with cold, hard lines and armrests worn smooth by time.
It was not as ferocious as the iron throne, yet it possessed a silent majesty born of ancient rock.
Aegon's footsteps did not stop at the door.
He walked through the center of the long, empty hall, the generals and elite Soldiers behind him automatically stopping and lining up on both sides like loyal silhouettes.
Only the sound of his own footsteps echoed clearly in the silent hall, thumping against everyone's hearts.
He went straight toward those stone steps, toward that throne.
The sunlight shifted just at this moment, a beam of light passing through a high window and landing precisely on that black stone throne, gilding its cold lines with a faint golden edge.
Aegon walked up the stone steps, turned to face the empty hall and the generals and Soldiers standing solemnly at the door, and then slowly sat down.
The sunlight enveloped him.
The black armor took on a dark texture in the light, his silver hair seemed to glow, and his purple eyes looked calmly toward the door, toward the sea and sky further beyond.
He sat there, on the stone seat that was once the ancestral home of the House Targaryen, the starting point of Aegon the Conqueror's expedition across the sea, and the symbol of the Dragonlord's authority.
At this moment, time seemed to freeze, and history and reality overlapped.
The exiled prince, the returned Dragonlord, sat upon the throne that belonged to his family.
A Bloodsworn Soldier stepped in quickly and knelt on one knee below the stone steps, breaking the quiet scene.
"Reporting to Your Highness! The castle has been completely cleared. We have captured Stannis Baratheon's wife, Selyse Florent, and his daughter, Shireen Baratheon, at the Dragonstone Tower."
"How shall they be dealt with? Please give your instructions, Your Highness!"
Aegon's gaze slowly shifted from the light at the door to the kneeling Soldier, and then cast further away, as if piercing through the stone walls to see the panicked mother and daughter.
"Bring them in," he spoke, his voice not loud, yet it echoed clearly through the empty stone hall.
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