Chapter 134 - Artican Trade in Westeros 61 (Return to Artica 02).
[Chapter Size: 3200 Words.]
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Pessoa Thrid POV
Westeros, 295 AC.
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The Artican fleet sailed across the southern sea of Westeros, reaching the southeastern tip before turning northward. It was then that a ship from Dorne intercepted them midway.
"What should we do with it?" Jon heard his captain while watching the approaching ship.
"Let it come closer; let's at least give a response to the Prince of Dorne." Jon said calmly.
"Alright, I will let the main ship meet them." The captain spoke as they waited for the ship to slowly approach.
It didn't take long for the emissaries from Dorne to come aboard with a well-dressed man. One that Jon remembered well from meeting at the Sunspear castle; he was always doing things for Doran.
"King of Artica, it's good to see you again." He spoke with much respect, far more than he used to during his visit.
"Tell me what your prince wants." Jon asked, arms crossed.
"He would like to have you at the castle again as a special friend of Dorne, King of Artica." He spoke with the same respectful tone, though seeming surprised by Jon's arrogant tone.
"You can tell Doran that we refuse, after all, I have more important matters." Jon spoke with an arrogant smile.
"But, King of Artica," he tried to insist.
"In Dorne, you called me Lord of Artica, or even Lord Artican; I don't understand your change when referring to me, but my answer is no." Jon said dryly before taking something from his waist.
"Anyway, here's a scroll for your prince, he'll understand when he opens it." Jon simply said as he tossed the scroll to the man who quickly caught it.
The man from Dorne quickly took the scroll while looking lost at Jon, who simply turned away and ordered his men to continue their journey north.
Jon left the Dornish ship behind as he went to practice some fencing with Arya at the girl's request, finishing his training and then dining alone with his wife in the evening before warming some dragon eggs and working on his new project to the north beyond Artica.
After all, the port in the west beyond the Fist of the First Men was not just for commercial use, but also military, a good way to counter the south, especially now that Jon had a broken relationship with the Seven Kingdoms. Moreover, he had to prepare, as Artica was already facing a war with the White Walkers and their army; the south might be welcome too, but he had to be ready for that.
Jon slept with Seryna, and the next day, as the fleet continued passing through the waters of the Dornish capital with local ships keeping their distance, Jon wanted to see the only person who interested him in that place, and his little seagull traveled to the Martell castle. At the woman's window, Nyra or Rhaenys sat calmly on her bed looking at a dragon book, which she always read to calm herself from something.
'You would certainly freak out if you saw my new collection of dragon eggs, which will fill the entire space above Artica,' Jon murmured internally and watched for a while longer before cutting the connection. He had no reason to stay, especially her; he would try to catch her as soon as he returned from Artica, while his next destination was the Jade Sea as he traveled through Essos.
He got up from bed after that and went to the prison on this ship, where a single prisoner was held, who was the brother of Lord Hightower whom Jon had captured and brought to Artica.
"You are here, release me immediately!! I demand it, I am a noble from a powerful house of Westeros, listen to what I'm saying, I have many friends and contacts, Highgarden will not let a savage bastard do as he pleases!?" He yelled before Jon slapped him so hard that the man fell to the ground dazed and stunned.
"Just shut up. I haven't visited you for nearly a moon..." Jon began, letting the man recover a bit before continuing. "You don't seem to understand that it doesn't matter who you were when you were captured. But I must say I intended to exchange you in a deal with your brother if he came to negotiate, but the only thing that appeared in the sea of Highgarden was the Redwyne fleet." Jon started as the man watched him cautiously.
"If we are here, it means we've dealt with the entire fleet of Lord Redwyne, I wanted to see your face of regret as soon as you heard the news about the destruction of the 200 ships, I believe you heard the explosions very well from here, but nobody told you what was happening." Jon said with a rather calm smile for this man's misfortune.
"So Lord Hightower, after looting Oldtown and destroying Highgarden's largest fleet... you don't seem as powerful as you appear." Jon said calmly.
"..." Lord Hightower didn't know how to respond, and if he did respond, he would receive another slap, as strong as the last while he still struggled to remain conscious after that.
"I am not here to laugh at the efforts of your kingdom, but to warn about your fate. You tried to use schemes against Artica along with your brother, so you will come with us to our kingdom along with the Redwyne fleet we captured, we'll keep you working forcefully for some time, you could say we are making you slaves even though Artica doesn't practice this, no one should take a man's freedom, but for criminals, we put them to help in the quarry, after all just keeping them behind some cells, doesn't seem like a good punishment." Jon spoke calmly.
"Wait!!! Don't do this... I mean, you can't do this to me, King of Artica, I'm sure we can come to an agreement and you can still leave without harming your relations with Westeros." He tried to kneel in front of Jon, even losing his pride at that moment, he didn't want to go to a place on the other side of the world, away from his family to break stones every day.
"Spare that energy for use in Artica Lord Hightower, you are now an Artican prisoner, moreover, this is the last time I will refer to you as Lord, so... I wish you good luck." Jon finished as he left the man who still seemed insistent on trying to plead for his freedom, but Jon ignored him, at least he had a better fate than the Septons and Maesters who tried to put him against the wall.
Jon was alone, he didn't like having royal guards in his shadow all the time, so he did some things alone, and didn't see danger in dealing with a prisoner in his cell, he left the inside of the ship while someone immediately approached him, the man wore a cloak while chains clanked against each other as he walked.
This was an archmaester who had boarded his ship after the sack of Oldtown, ironically enough, but the man, despite initial caution, stood firm in asking for Jon's help and he had accepted, feeling no malice from the man against Artica.
This was Archmaester Marwyn, the same man who had fallen in front of Jon while he was being escorted to the citadel, and warned him about the trap, the man approached him as he was heading to Hightower after finishing looting the citadel's vault and asked him to study the magic of Artica, with some conditions that Jon proposed to him, and as he accepted, he ended up traveling with them, so they talked a few times during the journey.
Jon, not having time to start reading the secret books of the citadel, ended up giving that task to the man to summarize them before he began reading them. "King of Artica... I've just read some books," he said.
"That's good, we can talk a bit," Jon spoke while they were at the edge of the ship, Jon listening to his findings.
"I read some ancient books, but I was interested in the more recent records and really terrible things... Maester Pycelle was exchanging letters with the citadel during the reign of the mad king, and they talked about putting a substance in his medicines to make the man even madder!" He spoke as if it were a scandal, not that it wasn't.
"These crazies... they probably contributed the most to Robert's rebellion happening." Jon growled at this information. The maesters themselves said they have their mouths in the ears of all the lords of Westeros and that they could control the Seven Kingdoms from behind the scenes.
"Yes, I never had access to this information, so it is really dark to read it for the first time, but there was another important thing..." He seemed about to release another scandal. "I don't know the details, but some records from an archmaester of the time claimed that Lyanna Stark was not abducted by Rhaegar..." He spoke as Jon immediately raised an eyebrow at this.
"What?!" He seemed very surprised by this as he opened his green and gray eyes.
"Yes... it seems that information was swapped for one that he had abducted her to rape her... it seems this happened at Riverrun, near the wedding of your uncle Brandon Stark with Catelyn Tully, when the scandal about the prince broke out and started the rebellion." He spoke and Jon seemed quite surprised by this before turning back to the maester.
"Do you have any more information?" Jon asked, but the maester shook his head at that.
"Sorry, the diary I read was quite limited, but I intend to find out more by reading other books." He spoke with an apologetic tone and Jon nodded.
"Alright, make yourself at home, I'm going to my room." Jon said as he headed inside the ship to his cabin, his wife was sitting drinking juice while eating grapes sitting on the bed, her belly was quite large at this moment and she displayed it while being alone in the room, Jon ended up spending the rest of the day with his wife. He kept vigilance in the north, and other sides of the sea to see any danger of attack, but he didn't do this often, he was still recovering a bit after using his powers to control animals of an entire city as he did with Oldtown, he was fine, but knew he had to recover a bit more after controlling thousands of animals, so he limited his powers just to sea surveillance, but sometimes looked to see something interesting happening in the Seven Kingdoms, like some of his animals that were still in the Kinglands.
In Dorne, the messenger man had finally returned to the seat of House Martell, "So he just handed over a scroll...?" Doran raised an eyebrow, not thinking Jon would be so spiteful, but he just sighed, opening the letter.
His children and niece looked at him expecting him to read, but Doran just kept silent reading the message from Jon to himself.
'Doran Martell, I will be frank, since leaving Highgarden, I no longer have patience for Westeros and its games, I have my trade agreements with you, but if you want to continue them, I will continue sending ships to the south, I hope you can receive them with our goods as agreed, I still want to buy sand from your deserts and make the port, so I hope you treat my men with respect as a business partner, however, this will end if you harm a single Artican who steps in Dorne, as I said I no longer have patience with you from south of the wall and I will act to defend my people.
There are two things I am making clear to you as well. First is about your brother, do not put him in front of me, otherwise, I would kill him and I do not care if our dealings end like this, I will do exactly that if I encounter him, so make sure he does not bump into us.
The second point, your maester sent letters plotting a trap with the citadel, he even tried to poison my wife, and I had warned before, also found out that he contacted pirates from Stepstone to attack my wife Ygritte, so, at this very moment as you read this letter, your maester is being killed by me.
So, besides being trade partners, we are not friends, Artica has no friendship with Dorne, not after how you acted with us and do not insist on this.
King of Artica.'
Doran read the letter in silence, furrowing his brow as those present watched him curiously. It was at that moment that the door was knocked urgently.
Doran, his face growing even darker, raised his voice. "Enter." He said, and the door swung open with a guard stepping in, his face filled with hesitation.
"My lord! The maester... his throat has been cut!!! We don't know who did it! It could have been a Faceless Man!!" He spoke as they found the maester writhing in the library, not knowing who did it, theorizing it was a man from the Braavos guild, but the perpetrator had escaped through the window, as a bird flew towards the sea at that moment holding in its claw, a blade tied to its leg, which Jon had trained to deliver a clean death when needed.
Doran just listened to that without knowing how to proceed... he was backed into a corner, just when he thought he might have a powerful ally to fight against the Baratheons and the Lannisters.
Meanwhile, the Artican fleet arrived in the Stepstone area in the next few days as it approached the first islands, but keeping to the open sea.
"Shall we do this, my king?" The captain asked Jon.
"Yes..." Jon said as he called all the ravens from the ship captains to land in front of him, he had decided this last week and it was time to pass on the new plan to them upon arriving in the region.
Meanwhile, in a town on Bloodstone, one of the islands located in Stepstone to the north, this town was formed by pirates and outlaws. Its only activity was illicit business; even a basic own trade, like fishing, hunting, shipbuilding, they did not have, while only distribution of loot, slaves, and prostitution dominated the town.
It was more of a refueling and entertainment base for pirates, a place that was even used to charge tolls from ships passing through the area when Stepstone had a dominion. On this day, the town seemed quite bustling as hundreds of pirate ships were docked, filling the entire harbor.
In a tavern, men shouted at each other, while there was a dead body outside after a fight, the prostitutes and alcohol were the entertainment for these men.
"So, we're going to attack the Artican fleet again... you know what happened to those ships that tried to attack 50 of theirs and they'll do it again, even after all the rumors," A pirate spoke in the tavern to his companion, keeping a woman with few of her teeth in her mouth while her breasts were exposed, and he caressed them.
His companion listened and simply pushed the prostitute off his lap. "Get out of here," he said with a firm tone, as the woman left to not get involved in the conversation, and he continued.
"Yes, a contact in Kingsland offered a lot of gold for us to at least wear them down, since the suspicion is that they use a trick of fire, known in the Seven Kingdoms as wildfire. So they want us to clear their stocks since a large fleet awaits them in the waters off Kingsland, summoned by King Robert Baratheon himself."
"But that's madness, isn't it suicide?" Another questioned, wondering who would accept this.
"Yes, it is suicide, for they will all die... However, some pirates are putting up some men to do it, since their contact offered full reimbursement of ships and a lot of gold. An irresistible offer, and it is being kept only by the captains, they haven't passed it on to any of their crew, so they are thinking of sacrificing them..." The other spoke.
Conversations like this continued to circle around the port city among the captains, especially as the days went by. They finally began to hear reports of ships seeing the Artican fleet coming from the south. This gathered a large group of ships filled with pirates who would be decimated just to serve as cannon fodder and diminish the enemy's power. It was night at this moment, and the men were preparing to set out the following morning.
"I still think this is madness," a man said to his pirate friend as he watched other men filling the ships.
"Let's just follow them to a part of the sea and then leave them to be destroyed," the man, who was the Captain, reassured.
"If you think this is going to work, then I'll follow you," the friend commented, until, looking into the darkness of the night, he noticed something in the sea. "Wait, what is that?" he murmured.
His captain beside him also looked and saw something strange emerging in the waters, but it was a dark night, with poor visibility. So he took a small round glass and put it to his eye, which slightly extended the range of vision, until he took it off with eyes widened after looking for a while. "Why are they here," he murmured, in disbelief.
"What are you seeing, man?" His companion asked.
"It's them! The Artican fleet is coming this way," he murmured as more and more shadows began to emerge on the horizon, advancing at full speed towards the port city.
Meanwhile, Jon was bathing in the glow of the night stars on the deck of the main ship, looking ahead as the ships sailed with no visible lanterns, just following the guidance of their owls in the air.
Since Jon was planning a surprise attack, his plan was very straightforward; he knew of the force that was forming in the sea of Kingsland. Thus, his new task was to dominate those who would attack him. He ordered all his ships to increase speed to catch them before they came to sea, catching them off guard.
They would dominate the city and begin replenishing all the stocks of wildfire, starting production on land to later return to sea and destroy all the ships of Westeros that would try to bar their return to Artica. Jon kept all his plans with satisfied glee as the city came ever closer.
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Raccoon Here.
Next chapter: The domination of a city and the destruction of a fleet.
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