Chapter 8: VIII: Tyrosh, Myr and Back Home

VIII: Tyrosh, Myr and Back Home

Tyrosh was lesser in their eyes, after witnessing the majesty of Volantis. Its people were boisterous and greedy, and the bright colors they wore, and their hair and beards, dyed brightly in blue, or green, or pink, or scarlet, were tacky and hurt to look at. Their tongue was a corrupted form of High Valyrian, so bastardized that Aerys loathed to hear it, and spoke the High Valyrian he learned from his tutors with even more grace, as if to shame them for their ludicrous accents.

Tyrosh was a city of merchants, and trade was considered a much more honorable profession than arms. They disconsidered also those of a scholarly bent, thinking them fools for pursuing something not likely to bring profit, and for this Aerys disconsidered them in kind.

For all that they loudly denounced the pirates stationed in the Stepstones, the Tyroshi were eager to buy the slaves said pirates brought in their ports. Aerys had no need or want for slaves, and the pear brandy of the city tempted him not. As for their gilded helms and filigreed armour, he cared not, for he had already acquired one of a better make from Qohor.

Of course, he had a hidden purpose for coming to Tyrosh. Once he had come to the city, he had refused the hospitality that its Archon, of the house of Adarys, Daemon Blackfyre's goodkin, had offered, having arranged lodging at the palace of his greatest opponent.

Aerys knew what will ail the realm later, and Tyroshi aid in the future for Daemon and his rebellion was not something he desired. Behind the closed door of his host, he prodded and suggested, offered covert support but no open promises.

They spent a few months in Tyrosh, dined and feasted by its many magisters and merchant-princes, using their novelty to gain access to any of proeminence, for Aerys to spread the seeds of change, so that, sooner or later, Daemon would find no support in Tyrosh.

He hoped that his doings would not get to the ears of his father's Master of Whisperers, nor to the ears of Daemon and his cronies. Though, for the latter, if such maneuvers incited in him earlier and more rebellious thoughts, Aerys would not complain. Let Daemon show his true face, rebel and fail, and let the realm be purged of this great folly. If Daemon's kin would flee to Tyrosh then, they might not find the city so welcoming of exiles and traitors.

Yet the Archon had caught on, for Aerys favoured others, but not him. An invitation to a dinner was delivered then, the messenger flanked by well-armed and imposing sellswords. Aerys had accepted the invitation, though the white cloak that had shadowed them all over the continent, Ser Willem Wylde, had been eager to unsheathe his sword and cut all of them down, for the implied threat.

He had not, and Aerys and his wife had visited the Archon, who had given them a rather cold reception, implying in honeyed words that they had overstayed their welcome.

They had left the city soon after, but Aerys hoped that he had done enough so that Adarys' position would be shakier. Shaky enough for him to be toppled before the Blackfyre Rebellion, or shaky enough that any exiles afterwards would not find a warm welcome in Tyrosh.

Myr was next, the last of the Free Cities to be visited. Located on the shores of the Sea of Myrth, the city was one of the daughters of Valyria that had been founded by merchants.

In Myr, Aerys delighted in directing conversations to rouse the ire of the Myrish towards the Tyroshi, having had plenty of expertise at home in raving against the Dornish. If his plans in Tyrosh were to fail entirely, perhaps Myr might persuade itself to go to war against Tyrosh, and thus take care of that thorn.

Aelinor was more interested in Myrish lace than his games of intrigue, though Aerys too gave attention to the wares of Myr. Mainly enough to buy a thousand crossbows of Myrish make for Summerhall's armoury. They had also bought many carpets, and mirrors and even stood for a painting commissioned from one of their most famed artists.

Yet he had another purpose in the city. Aelinor had questioned him after many afternoons spent venturing alone in the city. Though she knew enough not to suspect him of infidelity, she was wroth that he had hidden things from her with any good reason.

Aerys had shown her the fruits of his many absences. In his hands stood a contraption made of two lenses riveted together, with a horn frame that gave way to two horn straps attached to those, and with a clamp between the lenses.

"I've heard of the craftsmanship of Myrish lenses, and have even used their far-eyes", he explained, "so I had thought that if the can make and use these lenses to see far away, they could craft such lenses to permit a near-sighted man such as me to see clearly what he did not before. It was tedious work, but the craftsman has finally delivered a pair of lenses that permit me to see well, and do not cause me any headaches, as some previous tries. This contraption, frame, made of horn, has the purpose of fastening these "spectacles" to my head."

"And you can see as well as any clear-sighted man with those?" asked Aelinor.

"Aye," he said. "And I have had made pairs of these to suit the far-sighted too, several pairs that might fit my father, to permit him better ease at reading. "

He had greatly desired to achieve this task, for the spectacles were quite useful - for he had worn them once before, in a different life, and knew of the great utility they had. This was one of the advantages of modern life that he could hardly live without, and it needed not his expertise in making a reality. He knew nothing of any technology that he could make, and even if he would have liked a printing press, he had not the slightest idea on how to make one. 

So, as such, he did not bother himself with such things, nor with trying to bring science to a higher level of knowledge and understanding - for the maesters were stuck in their own ways, and not eager for change, or for the opinion of those considered uninitiated. Frankly, he had forgotten much of the physics, chemistry, and biology that he had learned in his years of schooling, and he had better things to occupy himself with - things he knew better.

Like history - he had dedicated a decade in his previous life only for its study, and he knew its ways and its methods very well. In this field he could make a change. Though if a modern historian saw what he set to write, he would not look kindly upon him - he had set to write a history of the House Targaryen, but as a scion of that house, he had thrown some measure of impartiality to the wind, and had interpreted some events in their favour, bending the truth to some degree.

His father had forbid him to write anything past the reign of Aegon the Third, for if his history was to be, in some manner, an official one, the thing thought it unwise for Aerys, who did not look kindly upon the Dornish, to write of Daeron's Conquest and of his ignoble death, or of Baelor's reign - for it would not benefit to the unity of the realm. 

And Aerys understood his father's reasoning - he could write dozens of pages on how a flag of parley can be understood in the same manner as hospitality rights, and how breaking guest rights had rightfully been seen as a great sin by Andal and First Man alike.

Or he could go on and on, with great virulence, writing about many of Baelor's folly, how he had angered almost the entirety of his subject, and how, if his father had laid aside his vices for a moment, could have easily seized the crown from the feeble-minded king's brow - though a crown of flowers was not worth much, and bring bloodshed and shatter the peace of the realm in a civil conflict. Perhaps his father was right, and such things were better left unsaid, unsaid and unwritten. For the length of his father's life at least.

Still, perhaps he could write a most virulent and honest history of his house - of all the wise men, fools, idiots and imbeciles of his blood - hard truths he could not write in an official history - for none of his family would kindly agree that Jaehaerys and Alysanne were a couples of idiots at best, but more likely two imbeciles. Write it, lock it in a chest, and send it to the Iron Bank to safekeep it for a couple centuries, until after he was long dead. Now that was a thought.

Beyond the spectacles, which took quite some time to perfect, there was not much left to keep them in Myr. When they left, they sailed to Parchments, the seat of Aelinor's grandfather, where they spent close to a month, Aelinor showing him the places of her childhood.

Courtesy bid them to return to King's Landing before leaving for their seat. Aerys reported to his father of his travels, of the Volantene triarch's desire towards lesser tariffs for their respective traders. He had shown him the books he had been gifted, giving him some in kind, together with several pairs of reading spectacles, a gift for which his father was most grateful.

Aerys was relieved that no word had reached the ear of the king or those of his council of his intrigues in Tyrosh and Myr, but he soon grew weary of the countless and repeated requests by courtiers to tell them of his travels in the Free Cities.

He had managed to wrestle from his father the permission to bring Brynden with him to Summerhall - any excuse from his father that he did not wish to burden the newlyweds with the boy did not stand after almost two years of them traveling in Essos.

The construction of Summerhall was now all but finished, and the many furnishings that Aerys and Aelinor had bought and sent to Westeros in advance were already settled in their place.

His status, and that of his lands, had been settled in a minute detail. He was to be titled Prince of Summerhall, his sons would be called princes in their own right, though only the line of his firstborn son was to inherit the title beyond this generation - he was in turn, entitled to have all his sons titled as princes once he became prince of Summerhall in his own right. His wife would be called only a Lady, though she was accorded the precedence of a princess of blood.

He enjoyed the same privileges in his lands as did the Prince of Dragonstone. He was to be an immediate vassal of the king, answering not in the least to the Lord Paramount of Stormlands - even conflicts with his neighbours would be arbitrated directly by the king.

He owed the king, his father the usual duties of a vassal - to give him military aid and counsel, though he was not required to pay any due or taxes to the Iron Throne, and neither did his subjects, and could decide at will whatever taxes and tariffs he introduced to his holdings. While he had to obey the laws of the realm, he could interpret them according to the ancient customs of the land, and as such, to keep elements of the old Marcher laws. While he could not mint money, he could collect whatever taxes and tolls he saw fit.

he had also been given leave to solely decide on the matter of his future children's marriages, though his father could prevent any marriage considered unsuitable. The Small Council however could not pronounce itself on the matter, nor could it offer counsel about it. Aerys was not about to permit his father's council to decide on the marriages of Targaryens, and especially those of his sons and daughters. After all, the Small Council were their lessers, and their role was to advise and help the king in the ruling of his realm, not his family.

The lands of Summerhall could summon a levy between one and two thousand men, and his incomes as its Prince permitted him to keep fifty to one hundred household knights and up to five hundred men-at-arms in his employ, and he had plans to keep those in the higher numbers if he could.

His lands were as such that they neighboured the Dondarrions of Blackhaven, the Swanns of Stonehelm, the Grandisons of Grandview, the Meadows of Grassy Vale, the Ashfords of Ashford, and the Selmys of Harvest Hall. At least he could thank the gods he did not have Gormon Peake for a neighbour. It was his Stormlander, his Marcher neighbours he had to win over - most who were soured or would be over Daeron, and even his brother Baelor, so that he would guarantee that they would not rise for the black dragon. And if he had to do that by bonding over hatred of the Dornish, while they lamented the undeserved influences of those snakes at court over many cups of wine (not Dornish Red) or by other means, he would do that.

As future events proved, fate would have him earn their loyalty in a far bloodier way.