Chapter 10: A Dragon's Fury

"I told you! I fucking told you!" Lyle Crakehall was pissed. Worse than pissed - the noble Lord of Crakehall on the verge of killing someone he was so enraged. "But no, you had to underestimate the Stark bastard."

"This changes nothing," Harry Strickland commented, irritated at the damn westerman being proven right. The commanders watched through their field glasses at the black, grey, khaki, and gold-clad Targaryen forces assemble two miles from their camp. Twenty-thousand strong and itching for a fight. "We still outnumber them, and can beat back any attack over the river if they try to flank us."

Addam Marbrand darted forward. "Ser," he told Lyle, deliberately ignoring the Lord Commander of the Royalist ground forces. "Allow me to lead our bannermen to victory."

He was waved off by Strickland. "No, other than the Unsullied their heaviest forces are still across the river waiting for us. Your landsknechts will need to hold the southern bank." He turned to Tristane Rivers, the commander of the Golden Company foot. "You will lead the legions into battle, with the knights on the flank. The Windblown and other sellswords will be in reserve." The sellsword Captains whooped in the air, while the Westermen watched with burning eyes.

Army clearly divided upon the dawn of battle.

The Targaryen Army halted, one long line along the floodplain. Eyes narrowed in the heat of the sun and staring intently at their raven-haired King, inspecting the lines. Peering at them with the violet-ringed grey of his eyes. Horse trotting back and forth, snorting clouds of hot breath into the chilly morning air, Jon felt restless. Only the presence of Ghost calming him. Unlike even a Stark, the steed was not the natural mount of a Targaryen King, and he chafed on the saddle as a result.

"You've ruined horses for me."

He snickered, almost envisioning Daenerys' smirk after their dragonride to the waterfall outside Winterfell - his heart thumping out of his chest as the wind whipped through his hair, heart thumping again within the warm steam of the cave while he and his beloved made love for hours. Dany… It had been their last happy moment… before everything happened.

He looked back at the shimmering gold of the sellswords, lining up for battle. Rage burning deep in his core. I will bring fire and blood to the whole world to hold you in my arms again.

"Men of the Realm!" he suddenly yelled. Voice carrying across the Targaryen line. "I am Aegon Targaryen, born Jon Snow of the North. The mix of the First Men and Old Valyria, and today I serve as the bridge between the farthest corners of the known world.

"From Astapor to Bear Island! From Hardhome to Sunspear, we are gathered to build a new world. To tear down the shit one we've all grown up in. Under the banner of the dragon, we will build this new world!"

"We are with you, Dragonwolf!" Lord Cley Cerwyn shouted, a far cry from the skeptical young man that had arrived at the summit of lords long before.

Drawing Longclaw, he leveled it at the Golden Company. "Those men, ready to kill you all, they are not of this realm. Men that fight for gold, for profit! Men willing to sell their souls and their dignity to stand behind Cersei Lannister, the Mad Queen. The heir to Aerys Targaryen's legacy!" He reared his horseback on its hind legs, as regal a sight if any. "I, the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark, husband of Queen Daenerys Targaryen, will fight alongside you this day - and together, we will win!"

The army erupted in cheers. "DRAGONWOLF! DRAGONWOLF! DRAGONWOLF!"

Smiling at his men, Jon trotted back into the lines, wildlings and northerners shouting and smacking his horse on the side. Whipped up into a frenzy. So juiced up that they didn't seem to notice how Jon was galloping towards the rear.

"Sire!" Jon turned his horse, Ghost circling around in a protective screen. Watching Larence Hornwood with piercing eyes that shone an almost violet. "Do I have permission to attack?"

The King's gaze shifted, following the snorting mounts and laughing Dothraki screamers. Arakh's twirling and slapping each other's backs - eager to finally face a human enemy. Especially one as rich as the Golden Company. Shifting again to a black blur staining the lower sky, just above the treeline. Jon smiled. "Send in the cavalry first. Force them to focus on the center." Cracking the reins, he spurred the horse into a gallop, Ghost bounding alongside as the King disappeared into the rear.

A chorus of horns heralded the commencement of the battle. Booming from the glistening horns of the Golden Company to the horsehide horns of the northerners and the Dothraki. What little cloud cover that had drifted over the flood plains had dissipated, leaving nothing but the vibrant blue and glowing rays of the sun. Each army tight in their formations. Watching. Waiting. Some impatient and yet some praying for further delay, but all with a realization that by the end of the day the Dusken River would run red with blood. That the fate of the Seven Kingdoms would no longer be in the balance.

"Good luck, my friend," Marden Tanner said, clasping the Unsullied commander by the arm.

Grey Worm nodded, glancing over at the lines of gold-plated infantrymen lined up before them. "We will see each other again behind a pile of corpses."

Tanner bellowed a laugh. "That's the spirit!" One last slap on the back and the northerner withdrew back to his command of the Stark Household guard, Grey Worm doing the same for the Unsullied phalanx.

Golden armor glistening, Harry Strickland rode ahead of the center of his force - the famed Blackfyre spearmen, soldiers that had nearly brought House Targaryen to kneel long before. Clipped to his side was the famed Valyrian Steel sword Blackfyre, rubies bringing attention to the intricate dragon heads carved into the hilt. Only fitting, he finish Aegor Rivers' dream by wiping out the weak dragons off the face of the earth. With a flourish of his cloak, he leveled Blackfyre at the enemy. "Advance!"

Shock troops all, Captain Tristane Rivers led the center of the Royalist line surged forward. Tactics patented against Dothraki raiders and the disorganized slave armies of the east, the fast moving peltasts clad in bronze armor shined by camp slaves till it was almost a mirror, shields of a plated reddish bronze and sporting a javelin and bastard sword. The ragged line broke into a quick step, urged on by mounted officers straight for the Targaryen infantry facing them.

"Nock!" Archers on both sides notched their arrows. "Loose!" Thousands of shafts sailed into the air, clouds thick enough in places to blot out the sun before plunging down at their foes.

Cries rang out all across the battlefield. Thwacks and smacks of the steel-tipped bows hitting shields and armor, joined by the wet slaps of flesh being pierced. Running sellswords tumbled with spurts of blood, while the stationary Targaryens pitched back, crumpling into heaps that men from the rear would quickly patch up. The eleven hundred northern and dornish longbowmen were unified together with the range to assault deep into the Golden Company lines, while Black Balaq's light sinew bowmen could only reach the front of the Targaryen forces - where Lord Hornwood placing his heaviest forces. Crossbowmen making up nearly a third of his thousand bowmen, Balaq's men were greatly outnumbered. Outmatched by the Targaryens commanded by Ser Davos Seaworth himself. "Nock!"

The first clash of the day began close to the river. "Charge!" Larence Hornwood and Edric Dayne leading the northmen and Dornish personally, the lightly armored lances thundered out from the right flank of the Targaryen host. Crashing into their outnumbered sellsword counterparts on the left wing under a flurry of arrows from the Dothraki horse archers. Screams of men and horses filled the air as the five hundred knights of the Golden Company started to find themselves overwhelmed, core of northern veterans supplemented by the curved sabers and rapidly moving Dornish. Lance broken on the armor of a knight, Hornwood drew his blade and kept the charge while Edric Dayne slashed through nearly a dozen enemies with his twin swords.

Led by the cataphracts of the Windblown, the rest of the sellsword cavalry companies abandoned the right flank of the Westermen - leaving a pronounced gap in the royalist formation - galloping to the aid of their hard pressed kinsmen and paymasters. Five thousand strong, such a force would have overwhelmed the northerners and Dornish with a core of fifteen hundred armored cataphracts and screened by further thousands of light horse, but providence was on the side of the dragon.

An undulating chant warbling through the air, hooves thundering upon the ground with the fury of the Doom of Valyria, the Dothraki promptly followed their Westerosi allies onto the field. War paint streaking their faces and twirling their blades thirsty for blood, they wheeled north, traversing muddy banks that would have swallowed the heavy knights whole - crashing into the sellswords from the rear. Hornblowers attempted to bark out reformation orders, commanders desperately trying to convert to defense, but the bloodlust of the Dothraki and the sharpness of their blades cutting through man and horse alike killed whatever strategy was left.

Curdling shouts and shrieking neighs filled the din, many a Dothraki leaping from the backs of their horses to knock a cataphract or knight off their steed. Horse archers never letting up their rapid fire. Crimson soaking the dusty ground as the maneuvers of the cavalry descended into a slaughterhouse.

Unlike the men of the north, of Dorne, or of Essos, the barked commands of local captains was not the way of the Golden Company. Centralized control of the notoriously greedy warriors was a must, the task falling to the half-dozen hornblowers stationed around the dappled grey stallion of Tristane Rivers. "Men, signal javelins!" Instruments to their lips, the heralders warbled out the command across the breadth of the fifteen thousand men. The line shuddered to a halt, peltasts drawing their hands back and letting the narrow wood and steel shafts to fly. Furious arrowshot from the Targaryens brought down hundreds in the moment of weakness, but Strickland and Rivers found the tactics worth it.

And worth the countless corpses it was. The javelins had the punch that the arrows lacked, crashing through shields and armor with their heavier weight. Force multiplied as they ripped into the Targaryen formations. Elite Unsullied, armored northerners, proud Stormlanders, and mobile Dornishmen, their forward lines were decimated by the scything javelineers. Grey Worm found himself splattered with the blood of his comrades, both adjacent to him falling into boneless heaps, when the hornblows of the enemy resounded to him. Golden Company charging in a single wave at them. "Sumby dōros!" Still disciplined, shields crashed together with a nest of spears projecting outward just as the peltasts hit.

Blood spilled from the first meeting of steel. The golden armored sellswords crashing into the spears, longswords, and scimitars of the Targaryen forces. Northerners holding firm, stabbing forward with their spears and swordsmen hacking in the degenerate melee that soon developed. Dornish crossbowmen joined with Davos' archers to stabilize the northern sector of the fight, while the sheer breadth of the Unsullied phalanx proved a tough target. One that Tristane Rivers targeted with a fury, keen on destroying the best Targaryen troops. Vectoring in his men-at-arms of Westerosi exiles. Spearpoints glancing off their steel armor and swords hacking through the boiled leathers of the hoplites.

The Unsullied gave ground, slowly and steadily, drawing the ire of the Golden Company infantry. Flanks descending into a morass as they directed their efforts to breaking the elite former slave soldiers.

In here, Tristane Rivers made a grave miscalculation. Committing his entire force in a single surge, the men grew tired after the first burst of heavy fighting. Adrenaline pumping, sending the sellswords into a frenzy of strength and bloodlust. Tasting the golden spoils that awaited them upon presenting Cersei Lannister the heads of her enemies. But the steadfastness of the Targaryen line, equal ferocity from the Westerosi and indefatigable Unsullied, many began to fall back a short distance to recuperate. Others taking their place, and again and again until the massive physical and mental stress intensified. Up to the point of exhaustion. Committed all at once, the fifteen thousand peltasts suffered greatly as their will to fight began to sap away.

Grey Worm, Cley Cerwyn, and Arstan Selmy did not fall victim to this, keeping two reserve lines of men knelt to discourage premature commitment. As the forward line began to falter back dozens of paces at the pressure of the enemy, commands sent the second line forward. Fresh troops adding their furor against the tiring sellswords.

Across over a mile, at the riverbank itself, volley after volley of arrows launched themselves at the other. Heavily armored Reachmen and Rivermen surging across the great bridge spanning the Dusken. Knights of the Vale fording the rocky riverbed, assailed by the men-at-arms of the Westerlands. Both sides fighting fiercely, the swords of Edmure Tully, Lyle Crakehall, Bronze Yohn Royce, Addam Marbrand and a dozen other lords tasting blood while many an armor plate was punched through by arrow and crossbow… but the sluggish assaults and general snails pace of the battle belied the riverbank as the sideshow.

The battle would be decided on the plains to the southeast.

Javelin slamming into the ground just inches from him, Grey Worm batted aside a sword and stabbed ahead. Impaling the peltast through the gut. Steel spearpoint punching through the light bronze chestplate. "Memēbagon!" He shouted above the clashing blades. "Lanta dekuragon!" Shield wall reforming with a booming crash, the Unsullied took two steps forward in a single unit - stabbing ahead with their spears in a copy of northern pike tactics. Spilling yet more blood as hundreds fell to the juggernaut.

Horns filled the air, joined by a groaning trumpet that drew Grey Worm's eyes - and the eyes of all the Targaryen forces upon the field - towards the west. A curse muttered underneath the stifling leather helmet at the sight.

Their trunks blaring a shrill warcry across the battlefield, there stood eighty-five war elephants. All thundering straight for the Targaryen lines.

"Iōragon kostōba!"

Except for a few well-traveled lords and the Free Folk - who had experience with mammoths - the sight of the war elephants were a stab of shock and awe. Towering over man and steed, they advanced at a slow trot. Tusks a gleaming white, ears wide and feet crashing in a thunderous rumble upon the ground. Trumpeting at will, groans leaving their mouths as they advanced. Draped in gold silk, bronzed tusks, and an island strapped to their back carrying four heavily-armed mahouts. One spearmen, two bowmen, and a crossbow-wielding commander. Peltasts simply parting like water around a boat as the elephants drew closer and closer. Fifteen breaking off to engage the knights and Dothraki while the remaining seventy took upon the infantry.

They reached the Dornish first, and then hit the rest in a staggered charnelhouse of blood and gore. Men screaming blood curdling cries as they were thrown into the air, trampled by great feet. Mahouts stabbing and loosing arrows, massive platforms rendering themselves immune from counter. The powerful beasts kept the charge, for nothing could stop their initial advance, ripping through the Targaryen foot, impaling many men with their steel clad tusks and heaving some of them into the air before pulverizing them.

Trained by the Free Folk in how to handle a charge of the beasts, by some miracle the line held together in the initial onslaught. Unsullied concaved in, letting the beasts hurl themselves forward before enclosing them, bristles of spears darting out to stab at them. The Dornish and Northerners fell back, archers firing deadly fusillades at the elephants and mahouts. Dothraki maneuvering around the lumbering giants and slashing at the leathery hide of their legs with arakhs.

The great charge started to stumble, but a rejuvenated Golden Company added their swords and lances to the fray. Stabbing and slashing. Hacking and thrusting. Given the extra breathing room by their secret weapon, the Targaryen line started to buckle. Rippling towards a general collapse and slaughter...

"BRRRRRREEEEEEEAAAAAAAWWWWWW!"

There was no mistaking the roar that echoed across the flood plain. For those that knew it personally, nor even for those that had no experience with the sound. It was one of those distinctive noises, and soon eyes confirmed the ears. Shooting over the plain, giant wings propelling him forward in a ear-shattering glide, was the great Rhaegal. Green scales dark against the muted winter's sun, maw open in another piercing roar. Perched on his back was the Targaryen King himself. Black hair and red cloak billowing around him, rage and furor burning in his eyes.

All fighting stilled for the slightest moment, both forces just paralyzed with fear or awe at what was going to come next from the sight of a lifetime.

Honing in on the elephants, Jon gave the same command as his beloved had done upon the Goldroad. "Dracarys!"

Whatever moisture hung in the noonday sky evaporated in an instant, air around Rhaegal's maw shimmering with heat before the dragonfire erupted. Bathing an elephant and over seventy men in the cloud of red-orange smoke and flame. Leaving nothing in his wake but screams and ashes. Harry Strickland, jaw trembling in a sort of respectful terror, calmed his panicking mount. Head turning to the men around him. "Get it out!"

Rhaegal thudded onto the ground, mud and dust fountianing into the air. Men crushed under his wings and talons. Hundreds others and several elephants scattering in all directions. Jon snarling atop him in rage, the green dragon clamped his jaws down on one of the rumbling beasts. Sinking his teeth deep into the leathery hide. The elephant let out a great shriek that would have shattered glass… then nothing. Blood dripping from Rhaegal's jaws as the sack of meat crumbled.

Archers fired a volley at the dragon's scales, but the arrows bounced off both Rhaegal and the King's plate armor. "Dracarys!" Dozens immolated in the resulting fireball, Rhaegal lurching upward with a beat of his wings, crushing another elephant, mahouts and all, with his talons sinking deep into its flesh. Another tongue of flame incinerated three more, drawing a roar from him and a thundering battlecry from the Targaryen Army.

The ropes and pulleys clicked into position. "Ready, Commander!" barked the battery Captain.

Strickland wasted no time. "Fire!"

THWANG!

Rhaegal's amber eyes widened. Father! Go! He furled his great wings and lurched up. But it was too late. Large bolts sailing towards him just as they had at Dragonstone… when his brother lost Dany.

Hearing the thwack, Jon felt the fear course through him from Rhaegal. Dragon telling him everything he needed to know. "Sōvegon!"

A deafening explosion of green-white shrouded the beast. Roar of pain and shock piercing the din of battle for miles. Another of Qyburn's contraptions, deployed before field testing… the battle along the Dusken being the field test. Wildfire-tipped ballistae, detonating on contact with the superheated skin of the dragon. Strickland's eyes gleamed with bloodlust. "FIRE EVERYTHING!"

All five mobile ballistae fired their deadly payloads. Bolts screaming in to crash into Rhaegal, dragon hooting in pain as the green-white cloud of Aerys Targaryen's special brew turned against the very bloodline it was supposed to serve. Dragon falling to the ground, landing in a rumbling heap only a hundred feet from the ballistae. King certainly dead upon his back as it whined and twitched, seemingly in death throes.

"Load bolts. Finish it off!" Strickland was keen on finishing this battle. With the Targaryen's bastard King dead, their forces would certainly flee…

Crash! Out of the smoke cloud came the dragon's tail, crushing a ballista into kindling with one swipe. The smoke evaporated into a red-orange tongue of flame that lanced out. Immolating the other four crews in the space of seconds. Rhaegal unfurled his wings, roaring his rage into the air and dissipating the smoke...

Revealing Jon atop his back. Unhurt. Valyrian steel blade gleaming in the sun. Rhaegal roared once more before he hurled into the sky, the King determined to finish the fight once and for all.

A sight which reinvigorated the beleaguered Targaryen army.

A dragon cannot burn.

A dragon led them.

Valyrian steel rippled through the air, sunlight glinting off of Oathkeeper as Brienne of Tarth shouted for all to hear. "FORWARD! FOR THE DRAGONS!"

"FOR THE DRAGONS!" In went the last wave of the third line, men-at-arms from Tarth and Gallowsgrey, Martell spearmen, and the howling Free Folk beserkers that struck fear into the hearts of many a sellsword - all had experience with the Dothraki horde, but none the boogeymen from north of the wall.

To the north, the young and dashing Ser Harrold Hardyng had managed to flank the elite Crakehall horse to find the gap where the Golden Company knights should have been. Abandoned to save their sellsword allies, he had no intention of giving up what had to be divine providence. Rallying his five hundred knights, the trumpets blared as the dove banner fluttered in the wind. Men of the Vale reenacting the great charge at Winterfell towards the far left of the Golden Company line.

Fighting for their King, their living god upon his green dragon, the Free Folk surged amongst the Northerners. Swords, spears, bone axes, and flint daggers hacking into the peltasts in a veritable orgy of blood and gore. Living wights ripping apart their enemies, Frostfangs howling like banshees as they charged. Thenns waving their battleaxes to cut down multiple foes with each swing. The King's direwolf snarling as it added the attack, leaping onto peltasts and tearing them to bits with tooth and claw. Joining the rejuvenated northerners in their all out assault on the weakening Golden Company.

Sixty surviving elephants anchored the line opposing them, but the burning husks Rhaegal left of their fellow beasts and the angry jabs from the sarissas of the wildling spearwives, Dornish infantry, Unsullied and northern pikemen were too much for them. Roar booming, Rhaegal unleashed another gout of flame, enveloping two elephants and a hundred men in the utter inferno that was dragonfire. Turning the men into instant ash and causing a primal scream to leave the elephants' trunks before they too succumbed.

One elephant, covered in arrows and mahouts all dead, panicked. Stampeding towards the rear. Another heard and trumpeted, breaking. And then another and another until all the elephants not dead or dying were fleeing the battlefield through their own lines. Men screamed in panic, tossed aside or crushed by the frantic beasts. Mahouts screaming and even jabbing spears into their mounts to no avail, beasts driven into an instinctive terror, the most feared arsenal in the Golden Company now becoming its destruction. Golden armor flew into the air as the elephants took no quarter in their flight, clusters nowhere near the animals finding their armor as a makeshift tomb from Rhaegal's pass after pass - scales glowing from the residual wildfire.

Long the bane of the world, respected but hated across the world for greed and savagery since the Blackfyre Rebellions, the Targaryen Army was not in a position to give mercy."No quarter!" screamed Brienne, Oathkeeper twirling before she rammed it through the armor plate of a peltast.

"Maghagon nopāzma!" In lockstep, the Unsullied surged forward once again, shields together and steamrolling through any force left in its way.

"WE EAT GOOD TONIGHT!" A loud, ragged cheer left the throats of the Thenn warriors as Magnar Sigorn led the Free Folk and Northerners at their foe.

To the North, the victorious knights and Dothraki joined with their Vale reinforcements to erupt into the Golden Company's rear, slaughtering their archers and the van of the fleeing infantry - Rokharro personally beheading Black Balaq himself.

Edric Dayne, Dawn slick with blood and having lost his other blade, peered through matted hair to find a man draped in gold. Mounted and armored but with plate glinting in the sun. Harry Strickland. Only the Commander would be this clean during a fight. Spurring his horse into a gallop, he charged towards the enemy commander. Dawn brought up to strike him down.

Just managing to hear the hoofbeats in time, Strickland drew Blackfyre to repel the attack. Steel clashed against steel, the force of Old Valyria clashing with that of a fallen star, but Strickland's moves were sloppy. Clumsy with lack of use, with the lethargy of the high command. Not as sharp as that of the Sword of the Morning, parrying downward, Edric forced an opening. Spinning in his wrists, Dawn tasted its newest and last offering of blood as it sliced across. Harry Strickland's head falling from his body.

Helmet falling to the dusty ground, Lyle Crakehall pushed back the blood-matted hair from his forehead. Watching as the green dragon circled above him - above the entire force of the Westermen. Unlike the sellswords, among whom had taken over fifteen thousand casualties in the ensuing slaughter following the dragon's attack and elephant stampede, his force had withdrew from the river in good order. Bloodied, but mostly intact.

And he intended to keep it that way.

"Keep them high!" Several white flags fluttered in the cooling breeze, waving frantically so that the King atop his dragon could see it. Gods, please let him see it. Many a pair of trousers had been soiled while waiting for the circling dragon to make a move.

The Seven heard his prayers. Hooting, flapping his immense wings, the green dragon landed upon the ground with a loud crash. Roaring with the fury of a thousand lions into the air. Directly at the Westermen, many trembling with fear or even fainting. Lyle certainly wanted to, though the Lord of Crakehall held his ground with the pride of his noble house.

Hopping down to the ground, the Targaryen King looked quite worse for wear. Much of his clothes burned off, armor held only by the metal itself and tattered leather straps. Covered in soot from the wildfire attack, but otherwise completely unharmed. A true dragon King… Where Aegon the Conqueror reborn had come from no one among the Westermen could tell. "Lyle Crakehall, I presume?"

Lyle gulped. "Yes, and you…"

"Aegon Targaryen, Sixth of his Name, born Jon Snow of Winterfell," the Dragon King answered simply.

It took a moment for Lyle to make the connection, shocking him as he did. "So Ned Stark lied to the world?"

"He did." Looking back at Rhaegal, the dragon watching everything intently. "I think we all know what will have to happen next. The choice you have to make. Out of respect, I won't say it, though just know the surviving sellswords did."

"Thank you for that." Sighing, Lyle turned to his army. "You heard the King, men! Do it!" Leading by example, the Commander of the Westerlands forces in the field lowered onto one knee, ancestral sword Tusk planted on the ground. A gesture followed by ten thousand Westermen. Bending the knee and pledging themselves to House Targaryen for the first time in twenty-five years.

Rhaegal threw his head back and shrieked behind his rider. Declaring an end to the slaughter.

House Targaryen had emerged from the Battle of the Dusken River victorious.

"Got any wounded?" asked the Dothraki healer in broken Valyrian, collecting the poor, moaning souls in several rickety carts. Behind were other carts piled high with bodies - corpse carts. Too many were in Unsullied black in Grey Worm's eyes.

Still, it could have been worse. "Yes, we have several dozen. Those that can walk are already seeking aid. Rest are over there." He pointed in the direction of the cluster of Unsullied wounded. "Please let them live."

The old Dothraki woman gave a toothless smile. "We shall try our best, Turgon Nudha." Several screamers moved to carry the wounded to the carts at her direction.

Wiping the sweat and matted blood off his helmet, Grey Worm glanced at the wounded. Some screaming their heads off, some quietly whimpering, and many other hauntingly still - only the soft breathing spilling the secret that they were living. So much death, more than Grey Worm could stomach. To sail with Missandei to Naath and rest. All I wish for myself at this point.

Suddenly, the commander spotted a familiar face upon the cart. "Marden?" Lying quietly, unmoving upon the cart was Marden Tanner. The man's burly form now quite white with blood loss, leathers stained with dried blood. Rags wrapped tightly around a wound in his ribs. Grey Worm was leaning down upon his friend rather quickly, clasping his hand. "Marden, wake. No sleep, not while wounded."

Eyes weakly fluttering open, his face lazilly lit up in recognition. "Grey… you magnificent bastard…" his voice already hoarse, a hacking cough frothing his beard with a vibrant pink. "Not a scratch… on ya'. Lucky fuck." He tried to grin, but it only looked as if he was passing out from exhaustion. "Hurts to breath."

Grasping the man's hand, Grey Worm gave a comforting squeeze. "Maesters and Healers, they patch you up strong." Anything to lift his friend's spirits.

"Nah…" Tanner shook his head, looking at Grey worm with firm eyes. "My time is coming, I can feel it, my friend." Another cough. More blood from his lungs. "I'll be with my wife again soon. Died fighting with mi' sword in hand." He tried to lift the bastard blade beside him, but his arms were too weak. "Gotta promise mi' somethin', Grey. Please."

Grey Worm couldn't deny his friend's last request. "Aye, tell me."

"Take care of my younguns', Grey. You and that sweetheart of yours. Please find my little 'uns and give 'em a home. They have no one…"

Words falling into angry retches, almost as if Marden was about to hack out his lungs, Grey Worm brought his canteen. Blissfully chilled from the cold wind. Pouring a stream down Tanner's gullet, the dying man sighing in bliss. All the while, the Unsullied's mind racing. Could he truly honor this man's promise? Have a true family with Missandei? She likely would… "Alright. I promise." As with King Aegon, when something once thought impossible was dangled in front of you, one couldn't refuse.

The tension left Tanner, his last worry evaporating. "Thank ya'." He smiled, looking up at the cloudless sky. "I'd like to know some peace before I'die." And then his eyes shut for the final time, last breath heralding Marden Tanner's final journey towards the afterlife. Above him, lips pursed in a tight line, Grey Worm stood upright. Helmet hanging in one hand as he clasped the other to his breast.