132

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298 AC

Summer Isles - Ebonhead

Eragon Targaryen

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"How much do you know about Westeros?" I speak up and ask and Belzal looks toward me while folding his arms over his chest.

"Enough." I nod and roll the words around in my mind before saying them.

"We would want you to bend the knee so to speak, you would keep all your lands and belongings but would be under us. To make things simpler we plan to keep it like Westeros and you would be a Lord. So you would be the Lord of Red Flower Vale and your child who you want to inherit it after you would be the heir to Red Flower Vale." He nods slowly and I notice he has a question so I stop and wait for him to ask.

"What about challenges? You will find it impossible to do away with the customs of our people, they will not stand for it even if you have dragons." A very clear stance but I can tell he is interested already and is mainly asking to see what we have planned.

"It will be much the same but there will be strict regulation on the challenging rules and requirements. A challenger will have to have something of equal value to what they want to gain by challenging. This way people will still have the option but they will not be able to do so just for any old reason or motive. This will ensure the Lordships of the various lands don't flip and swap every other year and the Lords can grow roots. Houses can be established much like In Westeros to pass on the legacy of a Lord and build up a history for the family." Nata delivers the practiced lines we have gone over many times.

It may seem fair on the surface and no one can fault it as if you don't have something to wager then what are you doing trying to challenge to begin with? But no one will be able to gain enough of something to challenge a Lord for his lands and businesses as a whole because the value is too high. The option is there to chip away at their hold by challenging the lord for pieces of his businesses and slowly raise their value but it will be hard. This way the Lordship is secure and loyalties can be built with the Lords over time instead of them changing so quickly that you never have time to build on the relationship with who currently holds the title.

Belzal looks at us confused before his wife leans in and whispers into his ear and he blinks quickly as he looks at her before looking back at us.

"So I would not be challenged unless someone had something of equal value to what they want to challenge me for?" We nod and he unfolds his arms and sets them on the table as he leans in. "What if they challenged me for a boat using their boat as the 'payment', would I have to risk my life for a meager boat?" I shake my head, this is one of the things we were hung up on.

"Right now someone could do that same thing and challenge you for your boat but you would likely deny him which you would still be able to do. The challenges will have to go through certain requirements so it won't be a waste of time for the Lord in question. But you could also choose to have a champion fight on your behalf for the boat if you accepted the challenge. You will not be able to use a champion if the challenge is for your Lordship though, that needs to be fought for personally." If people want to challenge a Lord for his boat and he accepts then it doesn't seem too out there to have a champion fight on his behalf.

For the Lord to personally risk his life for a boat seems ridiculous and a waste of time.

"That seems fair and is not too different from the way things are now, I see a massive advantage to this way of things for myself personally. I have no sons and have been blessed with many daughters, some know how to fight but I would not like to leave them in a weak position to challenges should I fall. A champion to fight on their behalf could be a valuable thing and their hold on what I have earned will be much stronger under this system. No one would be able to challenge them other than a handful of people with 'value' equal to their own." Seems we got lucky with this man not having a promising son to pass his belongings down to.

No one wants to see the things they built and earned fall into someone else's hands, he does not have a 'capable' combatant from what I am seeing to defend what is his. Under us and our rules, he wouldn't have to worry about that as the number of people who could challenge his daughters is low. Those same people would also not usually risk their lives which they would have to do to challenge another lord and so the number of challenges is almost zero.

The only problem I could see for him is someone trying to challenge the daughters of his for their hand in marriage and effectively stealing the Lordship by winning and worming their way in. But that is his family's problem and I wouldn't stop something like that as it will keep openings for ambitious people to vent their desires for power instead of trying to mess with me and mine.

"I need some time to think about what I have just heard but I would ask of you what you would want from me as your 'Lord'? I know the Lords of Westeros pay taxes and do other things for their king and I want to get that out on the table as I think." The fact he is not shouting and denying the possibility from the start is promising.

This has brought to my attention that the Prince of Golden head is an older man with a ruthless son who is unlikely to want to bend for someone. This reinforces the idea that it will come to ritual combat but I will try for it to be one-on-one with the rumors of the man being hot-headed. If they want to fight I will give it to them but I want to limit the bloodshed of the people I intend to rule.

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"Well, that went well." Rhaenyra comments as we make our way down to the vault to take a more accurate count on our belongings.

We have all hands on deck to count out the coin and ingots that are stored away, the gems are harder to assess the value of but we will at least know the amount we have.

"He seems to want to say yes but is holding back out of pride, I think he will bend rather than fight though. I also picked up on the subtle rivalry he seems to have when Prince Yula of Golden head was mentioned. That rivalry could be useful to pull on to get Belzal to bend and serve to see Yula defeated." Nata agrees with my thoughts of Yula not bending and having to fight with him instead to gain Golden head.

"Maybe, we will see more after they finish 'thinking' and only the gods know how long they will take to think. They are staying in the guest room we gave them though so it's a good sign in my opinion. Maybe if the messenger we sent comes back with a firm denial from prince Yula and we challenge him for Golden head then Belzal will join once we win. He would know we are coming for him next at that point and he would have little choice but to bend or fight." I pull out Brightroar and use it as a torch as the golden flames immediately light up the entire tunnel.

A hiss escapes Vhagar when the light appears and it seems to have awakened the dragon from a nap.

""Sorry Vhagar, we are just heading by so you can go back to sleep."" The dragon looks through squinted eyes and slowly tucks his head under a pink wing.

"With how much they love to fly it's weird that they like to sleep underground." Rhaenys comments as she finds Meraxes and rubs the dragon's nose.

"I can't wait until we eventually take them to Dragonstone, they will love the hot tunnels and caves in the Dragonmont." I nod in agreement with Danny's words, Arrax will love the Dragonmont that much I am sure of.

We arrive at the door at the back of the tunnel and Arrax lays Infront of it curled up with his tail laid against the door. He looks like really wants the door to be opened and I just hope he doesn't try to open it on his own one day with his flames.

Danny walks forward and puts the keys in one at a time and twists them, she then pushes the door open with some effort. Everyone else is carrying split logs or a flaming sword in my case so she takes a moment to get it open on her own.

Once opened the room is lit by the golden flames and the four braziers are visible so everyone splits up to deposit their wood. I head to each one and use my blade to get the fires going and once that's done I extinguish Brightroar and slip it back into its sheath.

Looking at all the chests both opened and some closed I realize we have many hours of work ahead of us. I shrug and get to it as I drop on my butt Infront of a chest that is already cracked open wide with coins almost overfilling.

I hear rumbling and look over to see Arrax laying across one of the chests and seems to have claimed it as his own.

"We will get to that one last I think." Laughing a bit at my bond acting like a greedy lay about I dip my hand into the coins and scoop some out to begin the long process.

"This is going to take forever." I hear Danny whine and can't help but nod.

"It's a good problem to have, we could have the problem of not having any gold to count instead." Visenya's wise words clear away the little annoyance I was feeling as I start counting out the coins and run into a problem.

"Hey, where are we putting the counted ones?" I ask and look around to find no one is getting started since they have a similar problem.

"We could dump the chest out and then put them into the chest as we count, this way we can try to stack them neatly and have it look more organized." I hear a chest tip over and coins spill out as I turn to see Shiera take her own advice and sent the contents of her chest onto the stone floor.

"It's not just gold but silver coins as well..." I sigh and drag my chest over and dump it beside hers and the pile of coins grows.

Mostly it is gold and I know for a fact this has to be from many generations of trading gems with Westeros Lords. This is comparable to some great house savings and I almost feel back for all the princes and princesses who worked hard to get this all together.

Well, great houses like Tyrells and Lannister's can get this much in a generation if not faster by selling food or mining their gold mine in Lannister's case. But this is a ridiculous sight for a foreign place to have so much of Westeros currency.

All the chests that had coins have been emptied into the pile regardless of size or shape and now we have an actual pile of coins to sort and count.

A trilling and scratching are heard as Arrax who was displaced from his chest by me is now staring wide-eyed at the sight. I have to restrain my bond as he digs his claws into the stone floor to try and pull me toward the pile. I give up and let the dragon do what he wants and he happily rumbles and purrs like a cat as he lays across the valuable metal.

"Well, I guess we have to work around him." Danny scratches his shoulder as she pulls a handful of coins off the pile.

A pitiful whine escapes Arrax as he notices us get to work making the pile smaller.