Fun Killer
For all that I complain about him, Sunfyre is the best mount to ever serve me, and on that list are many fine and hearty horses, hand raised Texas sized polar bears, and a team of dolphins rigged to pull my boat so I may both sail and and get blown from both ends by Dornish concubines. Verily, the dolphins did me good service, but locomotion via my spectacularly colored flying weapon of mass destruction pleases me in something deeper than my rectum. Perhaps all the way to the hard black stone people tell me is my heart, when they chose not to claim me heartless.
While some prefer their dragon's saddled to mimic riding a horse but leaning farther forward to reduce drag, I'm built differently with a congenital birth defect known in the common parlance as 'Hog Balls'. In accordance with my endowment of lascivious form and in line with my general contrarian nature, my saddle abandoned contemporary Targaryen design philosophy. Sunfyre carried on his back a comfortable eastern style saddle, with a large ovular litter - padded and railed for tying off along each side of carved mahogany rim - sporting a comfortable sealskin upholstered lead bench seat wide enough for two youths to occupy, or one youth burdened with means of mass impregnation.
Two of my younger siblings joined me on this journey, though Aemond intended not to return with our sister and I. Blackwater Bay passed under my dragon swiftly, and we came upon Driftmark in just shy a handful of hours as opposed to the two days of hard sailing needed to reach it from the Capital on swift ships, and the trip showed another benefit of building a non-compliant saddle for my dragon's back by making inflight meals considerably easier to pull off. I joined my siblings in the litter for a meal of smoked cheese and sausage washed down with wine, the three of us devouring the modest fare with our backs turned to the oncoming wind, gentle though it be from the same magic that allows dragons to fly in the first place.
Though still a young dragon, Sunfyre needed no break to make the distance of the journey, even with the heavier saddle and three passengers. His hulking build detracted not a bit from his endurance, and that build cast a shadow over old Castle Driftmark and Hull. The family abandoned the care of this castle since the building of High Tide and Spicetown. The dark stone construction now crusty with salt, and the lower levels flooded. Hull, the town beneath the castle walls, still operated as a port, though not as busy as the younger city on the north side of the island. A lot of ship building and repair work went down in Hull, keeping the town well off even with Spice Town sucking up as much of the money travelling Blackwater Bay as possible.
Passing over the low-lying island, we soon sighted Spice Town and my angsty brother and flighty sister looked about the city using far-eyes. The sight of the place dealt me much emotional damage, the obvious care in layout and ostentatious wealth on display in this feat of modern elite architecture put on by our 'lesser' sister house felt like a vicious mockery of my wasted youth. If only people gave two shits about the wants and words of children, I'd have already driven the smallfolk out of the capital and demolished nearly everything within its massive perimeter walls. I'd drag Kingslanding to greatness for the first time in its miserable existence and I'd make the Andals pay for it.
The state of the capital is just another in a long list of reason's I'm named after an absolute ass clown, but I put it from my heart and steeled myself for even more pain as High Tide filled my vision. White marble towers roofed in beaten silver, the shine blasting into my chest like a spear as the shame of multigenerational shabbiness filled me. One would think my life as a Mormont would inoculate me to the shab, but nay. I balled so hard later in life that I'd become accustomed to how a top dog lives, and the sight of my family, the top dogs for over a century, emperors of an entire continent, living like B tier nobles with D tier style offends me to such a degree that I often find myself getting a better workout resisting the cringe than I get in the training yard. Master level overcoming isometrics.
We'd timed our arrival for the afternoon, arriving far enough behind the ship bearing our mother and father for them to arrive just ahead of us with the favorable winds we'd enjoyed. The Sea Snake built his dream castle with his wife's dragon in mind, and with the ambition of more dragons to come, so Sunfyre landed in a wide courtyard large enough for the Red Queen, and even a dragon a fair bit larger, but not large enough for the mountainous girth of the now riderless Vhagar, who we espied on our way in. Servants aping the role of the Dragon Keepers - though not their swag - lead me to lodgings for my dragon, and then some Velaryion relations led us to the grieving family.
The Driftwood Throne lay at the end of the Hall of Nine, a personal museum of Corlys Velaryon's greatness, and the man himself sat atop it, a chair made of shipwrecked wood, legendarily gifted to the family by the Merling King, the god of the Narrow Sea, though held to mostly by Braavosi sailors. My father sat in an ebony throne next to him, and though it is not the norm, sometimes he dresses well enough to please me, and he did so this day, having remembered he is a king and cracked out the samite and brocade, matching intensity with the quality of Corlys' aesthetic.
At eight and sixty, the Lord Velaryon looked more hail than my father, despite the obvious bereavement. It felt strange, seeing someone I admire. Not just the boyish admiration of a great man, for I understood this man better than near anyone else in the world. We'd sailed the same waters, separated by centuries, but united in spirit of risk and adventure. I'd walked more than a mile in this man's shoes, and even endured this loss of a daughter myself.
I can't even remember her face, and it took an effort of will to even recall her name. The only image of her life still fresh in my mind is her small shrouded form on the pyre next to her mother. As we move through different stages of our lives it becomes harder and harder to remember what came before. We are not what we did. We are not the friends we kept. We are certainly not the truth. We are the stories we tell ourselves. More than anything else, tell yourself the right stories.
Here in the Hall of Nine, Corlys Velaryon gathered up great treasures of his past to ensure that who he is never becomes who he was. By constantly telling himself the right stories, the legendary Sea Snake inculcates the endurance of his spirit, giving him an edge over other men I have admired. Those nine voyages required the acceptance of great risk, the persistence of great effort, and the mindfulness of great adaptability. The sea serves as one of life's ultimate proving grounds where men learn whether or not they told themselves the right stories. On any day, the hard and icy hands of reality can come down and separate the delusional from the based.
Fill not your heart with the stories of cowards, nor complainers. Not with tales of the slothful, nor the sophist. Fill your heart with stories of fortitude and prudence, because when the wheel of time spins on and the past slips away, at least you won't be full of shit.
When my turn came, I gave the man and his wife a nod and a seemingly trite, "You have my condolences." which neither grieving parent believed, and went my way to enjoy the local snackage and wine.
Just because the man and I are more alike than any others in this room doesn't mean we will ever be friends or even allies, and not just because the man would never believe the connection. This man was my enemy from the moment I opened my eyes in this life. All who covet the Iron Throne are, and I'll not waist the breath trying to convince them to put down their ambitions, to denude themselves of their true desires. Any who does not want the throne understands not kingship, and is a cretin to his core devoid of manhood in both nature and nurture. I pity the fool.
I often destroy them.
Though propriety kept things somber, I enjoyed availing myself of the funeral feasting. Oh they laden my tray heavily with crispy goose and my goblet with Arbor Gold. I devoured honey glazed lamb and cod cakes and pork pies filled to bursting with carrots, onions, parsnips, turnips, mushrooms, and gravy. I annihilated enough crab legs to prove evolution wrong, and severed immortality one lobster tail at a time.
A good woman died to bring me this feast, and I saw her honored for it regardless of my mother's pointed glances and polite attempts to get me to slow down. I even ignored the impolite attempts, so dear to me was Laena Velaryon, and though the eating may sound excessive, the Warlocks of Quarth predicted that I'd be inches over seven feet this time around, and as they say in Yi Ti have a tiger's back and a bear's waist. It takes a lot of material to build a man that big, but I'm the right man for the job.
Alas and alack I was separated from the saffron spiced seafood stew by macabre circumstance, the coming of the burial ceremony in which the woman's bones interred in a stone coffin shall be thrown into the sea. The grey sky above threatened to make the somber weepy scene even more atmospheric, but the clouds withheld their load and my ears were spared the sound of anything like, 'Even the heavens weep at this loss'.
On that rocky shore, the younger brother of Lord Velaryon delivered the eulogy in High Valyrian with a stone cold face, lamenting that the mother of two true born daughters has departed on a voyage from which she will never return, but comforting the girls on the bond of the blood they share. Then he turned his head to my sister and her sons to extol the saltiness of Velaryon blood, it's thickness, and with a slight trembling, it's trueness. Claiming it must never thin. Even in this most trying of times, Uncle Daemon found a silver lining and spot of joy, chuckling at his wife's funeral.
Inner strength in the pocket.
Upon the sea's receival of the casket and with everyone satiated not named Aegon, we participated in that most hated tradition: socializing. On a patio by the sea, the who's who of the east coast assembled to mingle while maintaining the decorum of the day. That is how I ended up with a carafe of wine in each hand telling stories to two grieving four year old girls about their grandfather's voyages.
"Aye Qarth was the focus of his last great voyage." I explained to the girls, "And it is everything they say about it. Lust and greed run amok without somehow destroying everything. For millennia the city has controlled the most important trade route in the known world, and they never lost sight of that, which is why they can afford to be so decadent and silly."
"What's decadent mean?" One of the twins - I'd not bothered to remember the difference - asked.
"Luxurious self indulgence, and also a state of moral decay or cultural decline." I answered easily, "The Qarthi embody the first, but the second not. Their culture is stable and their morality has always been loathsome, thus no decay. They signal virtue through dramatic displays of emotion, rather than practice any real goodness. Ethics as theater. Performance, not performed. It goes so far that they make their hired killers say 'I'm so sorry.' before the murder. All is permitted in Qarth, so long as it looks good, and that makes them a step up from King's Landing, because at least they look good. Cheers to them for pulling at least one thing off right."
I raised a carafe to the Qarthi and their exposed tits.
"You speak as if you've seen Qarth for yourself, Aegon, but you've never left King's Landing before today." my sister arrived to spoil the fun, her oldest bastard following in her wake, "And putting down our home is unbecoming."
Rhaenyra wasn't as fat as the records stated, and she always dressed well, even by my standards. Today was no exception, though I find the red and black with an emphasis on black so dreary.
"Something something Dragonstone." I chuckled then apologized, "Sorry, couldn't find the motivation to say something so cliche and stupid."
Disapprove of me more, sister. Your hate filled eyes - wait, that's not hate I'm seeing. I noticed it again, Rhaenyra's purple gaze following the line of my jaw. Contour, they would say in the lady porn fiction. Hehe, nature overcomes nurture. My sister may fear me, and loath me by proxy, but at the heart of the matter, I'm hot. I'm hot and in her internal hierarchy her cunt rules over her head. It's not her fault. Whore runs in the family. Saera, Viserra, and Gael, vs Alyssa, Maegella, and Daella. It's a coin toss, and hers landed on the primal need to fuck rather than good sense. She likely thinks the same of me, that I'm some prime cut of Valyrian fuck boy. She knows not I'm a wizard, not with how my mother covers my wizardry.
Not to say she does a good job hiding my horde of bastards, more a general lack of effort by our opponents to research. Such willful ignorance should be protected.
At least until it's time to break them.
"Come, Aegon. You've had too much to drink to be around children." my sister commanded and I raised a brow.
"Too much." I grinned, "My buzz is light and pleasant, and even if I chugged down a barrel in one go, I'd not slur my words nor misspeak. I'm far too skilled a cunning linguist for that."
Nearby someone eavesdropping spit out his wine, and I gave him a nod and a finger snap in approval.
"That guy gets it." I chuckled, happy to be appreciated.
My sister looked livid. I'm surprised she ever learned a word with so many syllables. Look at you, Rhaenyra, depth of character. Feel proud.
"Aegon!" she hissed.
"Went right over their heads." I smiled and tilted back my carafe only to find it run dry in the middle of my sip.
That's what the one in the other hand is for.
I felt some pressure on my wrist but easily completed my task and looked at the pale hand gripping my green paisley embroidered sleeve. That hand belonged to my older sister, and I frowned. I believe this is the first time she has ever touched me.
"Need something?" I furrowed my brow at what I realized was an attempt to disrupt my beverage delivery procedure.
"You're making a scene." she hissed and I laughed.
"Hahahe, and here I thought you weren't funny." I tipped my head to her, "Perhaps I judged you too harshly. Another! This time a jape the children can enjoy!"
There it was, that teeth gnashing that I love to see. Swallow it all, sister. Or don't. Blow up. Whatever you do, don't bore me.
"You would mock me." she growled, then her anger broke the levee and she snarled, "Here? Now?"
"Enough!" came the outraged cry of the middle yeared matron of the Velaryon House.
"Princess Rhaenys." I greeted the tossed back more wine.
At four and forty, the Lady of Driftmark kept it tight, preserving much of her beauty though time added more lines and grey hairs. She won't live long enough to see that Baratheon black gone completely.
The woman sternly glared at me, then at my sister, "I'll not have my daughter's funeral turned into another stage for your family dramas."
The reminder caused the young twins to burst into tears.
"I don't want mother to be gone!" one sobbed as her grandmother knelt down to embrace her and pulled the other in too.
I sighed and looked at my sister channeling my disappointment into my face to the best of my abilities, "Perhaps not."
Rhaenyra really is a fun killer.
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