Limpick stood and walked to the window beside her. Outside, the sea stretched deep blue, waves slamming against the cliffs and exploding into white foam. Below the cliffs lay a field of black rocks; when the tide pulled back, thin white steam rose from the cracks like mist. Volcanic breath. Fire that had burned for thousands of years, rising from the mountain's heart.
"I will teach you every day from now on," Melisandre said, still looking out. "Until you have read The Book of R'hllor cover to cover. Then The Song of Prophecy, then The War of Flame and Shadow. Only when you have finished all three will you truly stand at the door of the Lord of Light."
Limpick nodded. "I will finish them."
Melisandre glanced at him once, said nothing more, and left. Her red robe whispered across the corridor stones and faded into the distance. Limpick stayed at the window until she was gone, then looked down at the quill in his hand—the tip was worn blunt, ink staining his fingers. He set it aside, returned to the table, opened The Book of R'hllor, and kept reading.
The days blurred together.
Every morning Limpick woke, recited the prologue of The Book of R'hllor from memory, then walked to the library to write and read. At noon a tray arrived—bread and soup, sometimes fish and porridge, sometimes a extra strip of salted meat. He ate quickly and returned to the books. He read until the oil lamp burned low, then lit another and kept going. Sometimes he fell asleep at the table, face on the open page; when he woke, a blanket would be draped over his shoulders. He never saw who left it—maybe the servant who brought the food, maybe the old man who swept the halls, maybe Melisandre herself.
She came every day. Sometimes early, before he had started; sometimes late, after he had already finished an entire chapter. She never knocked. She simply entered, sat across from him, listened while he recited what he had learned the day before, and only then began to teach.
One afternoon she arrived while he was still writing letters. His hand was cramped, fingers black with ink, the page covered in crooked lines. She stood behind him and watched for a moment.
"Your hand is shaking," she said.
"Been writing too long," Limpick answered. "It aches."
She reached down and closed her fingers around his wrist. Her skin was hot—hotter than any person's should be, the same steady warmth as Ember's scales. The cramp eased almost at once. She held him like that a few seconds, then let go.
"Keep writing," she told him, "but not too long. Rest every half hour. A ruined hand writes nothing."
Limpick nodded, rubbed his wrist, and continued. She did not leave. She pulled a book from the shelf, opened it, and sat reading in silence. The library was quiet except for the soft crackle of the brazier and the rustle of turning pages. Limpick wrote, then paused and stole a glance at her. She sat with her head bent over the book, copper-red hair falling on either side of her face. Firelight turned her white skin soft pink. Her lashes were long and dark red, casting tiny shadows on her cheeks. She turned a page without looking up.
"Focus on your letters."
Limpick bent his head and kept writing.
Time passed. He finished reading the first chapter of The Book of R'hllor aloud from start to finish. The words still came slowly; some long ones made him stumble, but he no longer needed anyone to read them to him. When the last syllable left his mouth, Melisandre gave a small nod.
"Good," she said. "Tomorrow we begin the second chapter."
She stood and walked to the door, then stopped. "You read better today. You are beginning to understand."
"Understand what?"
"Fire," she answered, and left.
Limpick sat alone with the open book. Fire. Did he understand it? In Riverrun fire had been life—without it you froze. In Harrenhal fire had been power—Ember and Plume drank it, grew from it. Here on Dragonstone fire was faith, a god he faced every day. He wasn't sure he understood it the way she meant, but he knew one thing for certain: fire was real. He had seen stones glowing with the trace of dragonflame. He had held dragon bone still warm with it. He had watched Ember spit his first real tongue of fire. Those things were not words in a book or chants from a priestess.
He touched the dragon bone against his chest. Warm. Alive. He touched the three pieces of dragonglass—one larger than the last, each heavier. He still had not taken them back to Ember and Plume. He would need to return to King's Landing soon. But not yet. Right now he had to read, to write, to learn. He had to make Melisandre believe he was sincere, that he was becoming a true servant of the Lord of Light. Only then would she give him more dragonglass, more trust, more access.
He lowered his head and turned the page.
The next day Melisandre brought a new book. It was smaller and thinner, bound in plain black leather with no gold lettering, only a dark-red seal: a circle with a flame burning at its center.
"This is Dragon and Fire," she said, setting it on the table. "It tells of the Targaryen dragons and their bond with R'hllor. Dragonstone was their ancient seat. They kept dragons here for hundreds of years. Do you know where their dragons came from?"
Limpick shook his head.
"From Valyria. Valyria was the homeland of dragons; every dragon in the world once came from that peninsula. The Valyrians used sorcery and dragonglass to tame them, to turn them into weapons, into tools, into symbols of power. Before the Doom destroyed Valyria, House Targaryen fled here to Dragonstone with five dragons. Those five became the ancestors of the three that later conquered Westeros—Balerion the Black Dread that Aegon rode, and Vhagar and Meraxes that his sisters rode." She opened the book to the first page and pointed to an illustration: a mountain crowned with a castle, dragons—black, red, gold—soaring above it, wings blotting out half the sky. "Dragons lived on Dragonstone long before the Targaryens arrived. The volcano beneath the island drew them. They nested inside the mountain, bathed in the lava, slept in the flames. When the Targaryens came, they tamed the wild dragons and kept them in the caverns below the castle."
Melisandre looked up, red eyes steady. "The fire under our feet is the same fire that once lived in dragons. Learn this book well, Limpick. The more you understand, the closer you come to the truth of R'hllor."
Limpick stared at the picture of the dragons wheeling above the black castle. Somewhere far to the north, his own two dragons waited in the woods.
He touched the dragon bone against his heart and thought: Teach me more.