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Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.
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"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
-Author notes-
Chapter 141: The Lion and the Kraken
The throne room of the Red Keep was deadly quiet.
Cersei sat upon the Iron Throne, her green eyes fixed on the doors at the far end of the hall. Her council stood around her, waiting patiently for the arrival of their unexpected visitor.
The doors swung open, and Euron Greyjoy walked in alone.
He was not what she had expected. She had heard the stories about the mad pirate king, the sorcerer of the Iron Islands, the man who had sailed into the Smoking Sea and returned alive. She had expected a monster, a creature of salt, blood, and madness.
What she saw was a man. Tall and lean, with a weathered face and a patch over one eye. His remaining eye was blue and cold, and it fixed on her with an intensity that made her skin crawl. He wore a dark cloak over salt-stained leathers, and in his hands, he carried a small wooden box.
He stopped before the throne and bowed. It was not a deep bow, not a bow of submission. It was a gesture of respect between equals, and it made Cersei's jaw tighten.
'How dare he…'
"Your Grace," Euron said, his voice smooth and cold. "I thank you for receiving me."
"You are far from home, Lord Greyjoy," Cersei said, her voice equally cold. "What brings you to King's Landing?"
Euron smiled, a thin, sharp expression that did not reach his single eye. "I believe you already know, Your Grace. I have come to offer you an alliance."
An alliance. The word hung in the air. Cersei glanced at Tywin, who gave her a small, almost imperceptible nod.
"An alliance against whom exactly?" Cersei asked, though she already knew the answer.
"Against your son," Euron said, his voice flat. "Against Joffrey Baratheon. The sorcerer prince. And against the Dragon Queen as well."
The chamber fell silent. Cersei kept her expression neutral.
"You have met my son," she said. It was not a question.
"I have," Euron said. "I met him in Astapor. He stole my dragon horn, killed my brother, and took half my fleet. He humiliated me in front of my own men." His voice remained calm, but there was a fire in his eye that spoke of deep, burning rage. "I have not forgotten, Your Grace. I will never forget. And I will not rest until I make things right."
Cersei studied him, her mind racing. She had heard the stories, of course. The word had spread across the Narrow Sea, carried by merchants and sailors and spies. Daenerys Targaryen had taken half of Euron's fleet. Joffrey Baratheon had killed his brother and stolen his treasures. The Iron King had been humiliated, forced to flee Slaver's Bay in disgrace.
"You went to Essos to ally yourself with Daenerys Targaryen," Cersei said, her voice cold. "You offered her your ships, your men, your loyalty. And she rejected you. She chose my son over you."
Euron's jaw tightened. "She did."
"And now you come to me," Cersei continued, "offering an alliance. Why should I trust you? You are a man who serves only himself. You would betray me the moment it suited you."
Euron smiled again. "You are correct, Your Grace. I serve only myself. But at this moment, serving myself means serving you. We share a common enemy. We share a common goal. And we are both in a difficult position. There is no point in denying that. I have much to offer still."
He glanced around the throne room, at the council members, at the guards, at the skulls of the dragons that hung from the walls.
"You have an army, a fleet, and the Iron Throne," he said. "But you have no dragons. And without dragons, you cannot defeat Daenerys Targaryen. You cannot defeat Joffrey Baratheon. You cannot even hope to survive."
"And you can help?" Cersei asked, her voice sharp.
"I can," Euron said. He stepped forward and opened the wooden box he carried.
Inside were a stack of papers, yellowed and worn, covered in diagrams and annotations.
Salloreon stepped forward, his dark eyes gleaming with interest, and took the papers from the box. He studied them for a long moment, his expression shifting from curiosity to surprise to something that might have been awe.
"Oh my…these designs…"
"What are these?" Cersei demanded.
"Weapon designs, Your Grace. Complex ones." Salloreon said, his voice barely above a whisper. "This looks like a massive weapon meant to shoot projectiles with tremendous force."
"It is a weapon designed to kill dragons," Euron said.
The chamber erupted into murmurs. Cersei held up her hand, silencing them.
"Explain," she commanded.
Euron stepped forward, his eye gleaming. "The dragons are your greatest threat. As long as Daenerys Targaryen has three of them, you have no chance. No matter how big an army you can muster or how high your stone walls are…your armies will burn, your fleets will sink, and your cities will fall. But if we can kill the dragons, then her advantage disappears, and we can have a fair war. One that we can win."
He gestured to the papers in Salloreon's hands. "These are designs for a scorpion…a massive crossbow that can fire a bolt large enough to pierce dragon scales. I obtained them from a smith in Volantis, a man who studied the dragons of old Valyria. With enough of these weapons, positioned strategically along the walls of King's Landing and mounted on my ships, we can bring down any dragon that dares to approach."
It was Tywin who spoke first.
"How many?" His voice cut through the murmurs like a blade. "How many of these weapons can be built, and how quickly?"
Salloreon studied the designs, his thin fingers tracing the annotations. "The design is complex, my lord. Each scorpion would require a skilled smith and several months of labor. With the resources of the capital, we could perhaps build a dozen within a year. More if we conscript every smith in the Crownlands."
"A dozen is not enough," Tywin said flatly. "Three giant dragons, and you propose to meet them with just a dozen weapons?"
"Then we build more," Euron said. "I have gold. The Iron Islands are rich in iron and timber. I can have additional scorpions constructed in the Iron Islands and shipped to the capital."
Tywin's eyes narrowed. "And what price do you ask for this generosity?"
"Nothing more than what I have already asked," Euron said. "An alliance. A fleet. A chance for revenge."
Tywin was silent for a moment, studying the Iron King with cold calculation. Then he turned to Mace Tyrell.
"Lord Mace, how many ships can Highgarden provide?"
Mace Tyrell straightened in his chair, his florid face flushing with importance. "The Reach has the largest fleet in the Seven Kingdoms, my lord. Two hundred ships, perhaps more if given time to prepare. And a hundred thousand men."
Tywin nodded slowly. "Two hundred ships. Fifty from the Iron Fleet. That gives us two hundred and fifty…more than enough to challenge the Targaryen fleet, assuming she has not grown her numbers significantly."
"She has thirty-eight ships," Salloreon said quietly. "According to my sources. The ones she took from Astapor and Yunkai, plus the fifteen she captured from Lord Greyjoy."
Euron's jaw tightened at the reminder of his loss. "Thirty-eight ships against two hundred and fifty," he said. "The numbers favor us. And if you want more men, we can always rely on mercenaries. I have some contacts in the Golden Company."
"Numbers on paper mean nothing," Tywin said. "The Targaryen queen has dragons. She could burn half our fleet before we ever close to boarding distance. That is why the scorpions matter. Without them, our fleet is useless."
He turned back to Euron. "You said you have contacts in the Golden Company?"
Euron nodded. "Yes. The Golden Company is the finest mercenary company in Essos. Ten thousand men, disciplined, well-armed, and loyal to whoever pays them. They have no love for the Targaryens…their founder was a Blackfyre, and they have never forgotten it. I have contacts among their captains. For the right price, they will sail to Westeros and fight for us."
"And what is the right price?" Tywin asked.
"Gold," Euron said. "A great deal of it. And lands, perhaps, when the war is won. They will not come cheap, but they will come."
Tywin nodded slowly. "Ten thousand men. That is not insignificant. Combined with the Reach's hundred thousand and our own forces, we could field a considerable army in a short amount of time."
"A considerable army that will be useless if the dragons are not dealt with first," Cersei said. "The scorpions are the key to that."
"They are," Tywin agreed. "Which is why we will build as many as we can, as quickly as we can." He turned to Salloreon. "You will oversee the construction. I want progress reports every fortnight."
Salloreon bowed. "Yes, my lord."
Tywin turned back to Euron. "You will contact the Golden Company. Negotiate the terms. But do not commit to anything without my approval. Is that understood?"
Euron's eye flickered with something that might have been irritation, but he nodded. "Understood, my lord."
"Then we are agreed," Tywin said. He looked at Cersei, his expression unreadable. "Unless you have objections, Your Grace?"
Cersei met her father's gaze. She hated being sidelined, hated being treated as a figurehead while Tywin made the decisions. But she also knew that this was not the time to assert her authority.
"No objections," she said, her voice cold. Then she turned to Euron.
"And what of Joffrey?" Cersei asked, her voice quiet. "What of my son? What have you planned for him? I assume you know about the strange things he can do. This…magic of his."
She glanced down at the throne beneath her. The same throne Joffrey had transformed with his magic.
Euron's smile faded, replaced by something colder. "Joffrey Baratheon is a different problem. He has magic…powerful sorcery. And I will admit that his proficiency for the arcane arts goes far beyond my understanding. But he is still a man. He bleeds and feels pain, so he can be killed by normal means if caught off guard."
"How?" Cersei demanded. "He is protected by powers beyond our understanding. I saw him using them in this very chamber not too long ago. My seven Kingsguard together could not even touch him."
"We attack him from a distance, when he doesn't expect it," Euron said. "With poison. With patience." He paused, his eye meeting hers. "I have killed many men in my time, Your Grace. Some were kings. Some were sorcerers. Some were gods, or so they claimed. But in the end, they all died the same way. A knife in the back. A cup of poisoned wine. A flying arrow. A moment of carelessness is all it takes. I can work with that."
He stepped closer, his voice dropping to a whisper. "Joffrey is not a god. He is a boy with too much power and too little wisdom. He will make a mistake. And when he does, I will be there to take him out."
Cersei was silent for a long moment, studying him. She did not trust him…she would never trust him, but she believed his words. He wanted Joffrey dead as much as she did. Perhaps even more.
'One can never have too many tools,' she thought.
"Joffrey is not an easy man to kill," Cersei said, her voice carefully neutral. "What makes you think you can succeed where others have failed?"
Euron's eye flickered with something that might have been amusement. "Because I am someone who learns from their mistakes, Your Grace. That is how I survived until now. I underestimated him in Astapor. I will not do so again."
He stepped back, his voice returning to normal. "You can leave the sorcerer to me."
Cersei studied him for a long moment. Then she nodded slowly.
"Very well," she said. "We will work together. The Iron Fleet will join with the Royal Fleet. We will build the scorpions. We will hire the Golden Company. And you will deal with Joffrey."
She rose from the Iron Throne, her green eyes fixed on Euron's face.
"But know this, Lord Greyjoy. If you betray me, if you so much as look at me wrong, I will have you killed. I will have your fleet destroyed. I will have your islands burned to the ground. Do you understand?"
Euron smiled, that thin, sharp expression. "I understand perfectly, Your Grace. And I would expect nothing less."
<><>
Above them, in the shadowed gallery that overlooked the throne room, a young girl pressed herself against the cold stone wall, her heart pounding in her chest.
Myrcella had not meant to spy. She had come to the throne room looking for her mother, wanting to apologize for their argument the day before. She had arrived just as Euron Greyjoy was announced, and she had hidden herself in the shadows, watching, listening.
She had heard everything.
The alliance. The dragon-killing weapons. The Golden Company. The plan to kill Joffrey.
Myrcella's hands trembled. She wanted to scream. She wanted to run. She wanted to do something, anything, to stop what she had just heard.
But she was only a girl. What could she do?
She pressed her back against the wall, her breath coming in shallow gasps.
'I must warn him,' she thought. 'I must warn Joffrey.'
But how? He was in Meereen, a thousand miles away. She had no way to reach him. 'Wait…no.' She recalled something that Joffrey left her before parting ways.
'I need to hurry.'
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