Title: The Groundbreaking

Title: The Groundbreaking

Year and Month: 104 AC, 4th Moon

A year had passed since I had declared my new Dornish policy, a year since I had pivoted the foreign policy of my kingdom from one of armed containment to one of aggressive economic integration. In the world of business, announcing a bold new strategic direction is easy. It wins praise from the commentators and excites the shareholders. The true, grinding work lies in the execution—the logistics, the personnel management, the overcoming of internal resistance from those wedded to the old ways of doing things. The first year of my reign was not spent on the throne receiving accolades; it was spent in the trenches of implementation, ensuring the groundbreaking for my grand project was not merely ceremonial, but foundational.

The first phase, Infrastructure, began with a roar of hammers and the crack of whips. At my command, the royal treasury released a significant tranche of capital to the Army Corps of Engineers—a formal body I had established, much to the Grand Maester's confusion. Their task was to transform the rugged, treacherous roads of the Dornish Marches into wide, paved arteries of commerce. This was an immense undertaking. Legions of laborers, masons, and engineers were dispatched to the Prince's Pass and the Boneway.

From the sky, on Balerion's back, I would conduct my inspections. It was a breathtaking sight. I would soar high above the Red Mountains, a silent, black speck against the brilliant blue sky, and watch the methodical progress below. I could see the lines of the new roads being carved into the landscape, the encampments of the workers, the steady stream of supply wagons heading south. Balerion's heat-vision allowed me to assess the integrity of the stonework, to spot inefficiencies in the labor camps, to see the project not just as a king, but as a project manager with an impossible vantage point. I would send missives back to the foremen with observations so precise—noting a weak section of retaining wall or a poorly situated supply depot—that they began to whisper that the King had spies everywhere, or perhaps could see through the very mountains themselves.

Alongside the roads, we built the trading posts. These were not the flimsy wooden stalls of a country fair. They were formidable structures, small castles in their own right. I had personally reviewed the architectural plans. They were designed with thick stone walls, defensible gatehouses, and deep wells. They were designed to be bastions of commerce, but they were also, as I had promised Lord Baratheon, forts. They were a clear, physical statement: we welcome trade, but we are not fools. Come with coin, and you will find welcome. Come with swords, and you will find stone and steel.

This aggressive push into the Marches inevitably provoked the second and most challenging phase of my initial plan: managing internal resistance. The marcher lords—the Fowlers, the Daynes of Starfall, the Yronwoods of Yronwood—were a proud, ancient, and stubborn people. Their entire identity was forged in a crucible of eternal warfare with Dorne. To them, a Dornishman was not a potential customer; he was a lifelong enemy. Peace was a lull between wars, and trade was a form of treason.

I summoned the most powerful of them to King's Landing for a private council. Lord Fowler, Lord Dayne, and the formidable old Lord Anders Yronwood, known as the Bloodroyal, a man whose ancestors had been kings before the Targaryens had even heard of Westeros. They came reluctantly, their faces grim, their posture radiating a sullen defiance.

We met in the Small Council chamber. I sat at the head of the table, the Conqueror's crown on my brow. I had them sit on one side of the table, a united bloc of opposition. Lord Corlys and Lord Boremund Baratheon sat on the other, representing the Crown's interests. I wanted the marcher lords to feel the weight of the forces arrayed with me.

"My lords," I began, my voice calm and devoid of preamble. "I have summoned you here to discuss your lack of cooperation with the Crown's infrastructure projects in your lands."

Lord Yronwood, a man with a craggy, weather-beaten face and eyes like chips of flint, spoke first. His voice was a low growl. "Your Grace, we are your loyal servants. But what you ask is madness. You pave roads for Dornish vipers to slither into our lands. You build trading posts that will surely become targets for their raiders. You ask us to welcome the very men we have spent our lives fighting."

"I do not ask you to welcome them, Lord Yronwood," I replied, my voice cool. "I ask you to profit from them. Your lands are rock and sand. Your people are poor. You live in a constant state of readiness for a war that has bled your houses for a thousand years. Has this strategy been profitable for you?"

"It is a matter of honor, not profit!" Yronwood retorted, his hand instinctively going to the pommel of his sword.

"Honor is an asset that does not fill the belly of a starving child, my lord," I said, my gaze unwavering. "Your honor has kept you poor. Your honor has kept you weak. The Crown is now offering you a new strategy. One that will bring wealth to your lands, that will build new villages, that will make your people strong. The King's Peace is not a matter of honor. It is a matter of prosperity. And my peace will extend to my borders."

"You would have us trade with the men who killed our grandfathers?" sneered Lord Fowler.

"I would have you sell them the steel for their ploughs and the grain for their bread," I said. "I would have their economy become so dependent on the goods you provide that the thought of disrupting that trade would be unthinkable to them. I am offering you a different kind of sword, my lords. A sword of commerce. It is a weapon far more powerful and far more permanent than the steel at your hip."

Lord Boremund Baratheon, a man who understood the language of strength, spoke up in his booming voice. "The King's strategy is sound. A strong March is a prosperous March. My own lands will benefit from the trade that flows north. The Stormlords stand with the King."

Corlys Velaryon added his own silky, cutting observation. "And my fleets now control the seas to the east. The Dornish have only one direction to look for trade now, my lords. North. Towards you. You can either be the gatekeepers to that wealth, or you can be the stubborn rocks upon which it breaks. But the tide is coming, regardless of your wishes."

I had them cornered. I had the economic power, the naval power, and the political backing of the great houses at their backs. They were isolated.

I leaned forward, my voice dropping to a low, intense register. "Let me be clear. This is not a debate. This is the new reality. You will cooperate. You will provide logistical support to my engineers. You will provide guards for the caravans. And you will reap the benefits. The Crown will be taking a ten percent tax on all goods that pass through the new trading posts. Of that ten percent, I am granting two percent—a full fifth of the Crown's share—directly to the marcher lords whose lands the posts are on. You will become richer under my peace than you ever were under your own wars."

I had offered them a deal. An incentive. A cut of the profits. This was language they understood better than honor.

"Refuse," I concluded, my voice turning to ice, "and I will be forced to conclude that you are incapable of governing your own lands effectively. I will be forced to garrison the Marches with my own men, under a royal commander. I will be forced to assume direct control of the roads and the posts. And you will receive nothing. The choice is yours. The past, or the future."

They sat in stunned silence. They had come expecting to argue about tradition and honor. They had walked into a corporate boardroom and been presented with an offer they could not refuse. They saw before them not a boy king, but a ruthless pragmatist who wielded ledgers like weapons and spoke of percentages and returns.

Lord Yronwood, the old Bloodroyal, looked at me for a long, hard moment. I saw a flicker of understanding, of grudging respect, in his flinty eyes. He gave a single, curt nod. "We will… cooperate, Your Grace."

The internal resistance was broken. The groundwork was laid. It was time for Phase Three.

The selection of an envoy to Dorne was a critical decision. I needed a man who was not a warrior, not a great lord with his own pride at stake. I needed a man who was shrewd, patient, observant, and utterly loyal. I found him in the master of coin's own household: a man named Ser Runcel Hightower, a distant cousin to Otto, but a man of far more subtle and less grasping ambition. He was a second son, a knight whose skill was in numbers and negotiation, not in the lists. He had spent years as a trade attaché in Braavos and had a keen understanding of economics.

I summoned him to my solar. He was a thin, neat man with intelligent eyes that missed nothing. I explained the mission to him in detail, giving him the letter the Grand Maester had penned under my direct supervision.

"Your mission, Ser Runcel, is not to demand," I instructed him. "It is to offer. You are not an envoy of a conqueror. You are the representative of a potential business partner. You will speak of tariffs, of trade routes, of mutual security for caravans. You will praise the quality of Dornish wine and the beauty of their stonework. You will be respectful of their customs and their prince. But you will also make it clear, subtly, that the world is changing. That the sea lanes are becoming more… orderly. And that the wisest path to prosperity now lies to the north."

"I am to sell them on a deal, Your Grace," Ser Runcel summarized, his understanding immediate.

"Precisely," I said. "You are the senior vice president of new market acquisition. Do not fail."

Ser Runcel departed for Sunspear two weeks later, travelling not with a great host, but with a small, dignified retinue. His journey was long, and for a month, the capital waited in silence. The Small Council was on edge. Lord Baratheon still grumbled that the Dornish would send back Ser Runcel's head in a box.

Then, a raven arrived. Not from Ser Runcel, but from Sunspear itself. It bore the seal of House Martell. The letter was addressed to me, King Aeryn.

I read it in the Small Council chamber. It was from Prince Qoren Martell. The language was proud, cautious, and steeped in the formal traditions of his people. He acknowledged my condolences for my father. He spoke of the long and bloody history between our people. He made no promises. He offered no concessions.

But at the end of the letter were the three sentences that signaled the success of my entire strategy.

"The proposal your envoy brings is… unorthodox. The Princess of Dorne and I find its premises intriguing. We will grant Ser Runcel Hightower a formal audience to discuss this 'Treaty of Mutual Prosperity' further."

A quiet gasp went through the room. Lord Baratheon looked shocked. Corlys Velaryon laughed, a short, sharp bark of pure admiration.

They saw a diplomatic breakthrough. I saw a potential client agreeing to a second meeting. The groundbreaking was complete. The foundation was laid. The unconquered market, for the first time in a hundred years, was finally, cautiously, opening for business.