15 Dragonlord Conclave

The day of the Conclave soon arrived; Kael went out of his tower on Neltharion way earlier than he was supposed to, Vaela and Valanar would come later when the actual meeting started. After gathering the intel on the five sacred Dragonlord families, he had a hunch of what this Conclave was really all about, ironically, he wasn't really the reason, but he could still profit from it.

The Conclave would always be held in the Capitol tower in the Capital of Valyria, it was the biggest building in the freehold and possibly in all Planetos at this point. It was so vast that the top floors were open, supported by large carved pillars, an area dedicated for the dragons to land and rest while the Dragonlords went to the lower floors.

The Capitol Tower was built right in the center of Valyria, if there were any changes in the laws, an important announcement, declaration of war, state of emergency (used in case of external invasions or dangerous rebellions), trials and other related things, this was the place for it. It also held the record of all free men, nobles, Dragonlords and even dragons birthed in Valyria. Along with marriages, and divorces (although they called it "severance" in Valyria. And yes, there were divorces!) this place also had the record of everyone's crimes, lands, and businesses.

Just looking at the surface one would think that this place was extremely modern, as it did have modern structure and documentation. But one can't ignore the fact that men in Planetos were not born equal, free men had some rights, nobles had more rights, and Dragonlords had even more rights. Based only on that one would understand that justice here by no means meant equality. For example, if a free woman marries a nobleman, she would have no right to request for severance, they were not equals even after marriage, and the same goes for a noblewoman or man marrying into a Dragonlord family.

As for why people would do that? Not every family was like the Belaerys with hordes of children, sometimes they would only birth men or woman and not both, many times human hearts and desires speaks louder than family duties and people want to marry someone they "love". Conflict between powerful families, nobles and Dragonlords, would also cause the death of many. So, to repopulate their own, they would marry lower caste, in order to prevent having an equal spouse from a possible rival family, just like the Targaryens did with the Velaryons in the books.

From a distance Kael could see the gargantuan building, the main tower itself was huge, and had a massive dragon statue bigger than Neltharion on top of it, with many smaller towers surrounded and connected to the main building. Golden domed roofs, detailed carved walls with massive golden dragon statues on top of the massive "lower area" of the tower, connected with a huge long bridge that faced the sea made this place look more magical than anywhere in this world.

[Again, Image here for reference]

'I'm glad I painted this place; I don't think I can replicate its majesty with my resources alone. '

As he landed on the top floors of the capitol tower with Neltharion, dismounting his best lizard buddy right after and leaving him to the care of the poor souls that will have to feed him there. 'I pay your salaries, you better fucking feed him well!' he eyed the ten or so dragon handlers.

As he went toward the stairway there was only dismay on his face.

"… more fucking stairs…"

He walked down the stairs while enjoying the view of the whole capital through the fancy glass windows, Valyria was beautiful indeed and he will forever miss this place, but it also cemented his desire to build something that could one day be equal or perhaps surpass it. Kael didn't notice but for a while now he has been very into magic, who can blame him? Magic is magic after all, who doesn't want to cast fireballs and ride dragons? But his desire for magical knowledge slowly turned into something more than just a need for survival, it became… passion.

He walked into what looked to be a lounge area, he could see several comfortably padded benches made of well-carved stone, even the floor had details of dragons "dancing" all around, and many sources of light would be hanging from the floor like lamps, but there was no energy cable, they were just hanging there, illuminating the room like small stars on many corners of the round room, but what took his attention was what was in the center, a round rock of purely black material on top of what looked like a support made of Valyrian steel with engraved Valyrian words.

'A meteorite!' Kael's eyes went wide, he didn't know what was inside this place, he never actually came in here before and stuff like this wasn't really recorded in his library since his position allows him to come here any time he wants anyway.

One man approached him when he reached there, and by the look of the man it seemed that he was being expected by someone. It was somewhat weird considering he came way earlier than was intended.

"Fire and Blood, you must be Lord of Regallyon. Correct?" The man asked, he had long hair and beard but he looked young, the top half of his hair was platinum while the lower part of his hair was golden blonde, his eyes were pale blue and even his beard had tuffs of platinum and gold. His robes were fancy but not extravagant like Dragonlords, which led Kael to believe that he was a servant.

"Fire and Blood, yes I am, and whom should you be?" Kael nodded in acknowledgment, this floor was only for Dragonlords, so whomever this man served, it was someone with influence and power.

"My name is Illandys, I was waiting for your arrival, my Lord" he said respectfully.

Kael raised one of his eyebrows "Am I expected? This early?"

The man simply nodded and offered a welcoming and friendly smile "Yes, my Liege would like to have a word with you."

Knowing that he didn't have much to do until the Conclave started other than sightseeing, which was the reason he came early in the first place, he accepted "Sure thing, lead the way."

Hours went by, and slowly roars of dragons echoed through the Capitol Tower, many Dragonlords arriving one after the other, even in Valyria the sight of many riders congregating in one place was an uncommon sight, for a Dragonlord family to live in the Capital they are either extremely powerful or pitifully weak, of the forty families around twenty-five to thirty lived outside the Capital and would come from time to time.

Kael arrived and saw the room already half full, his sister and Valanar were waiting as well.

When one thinks of a council room, it's either a huge table with many seats for the big Lords to sit and talk similar to King Arthur's round table, but for Dragonlords? That's stupid. First of all, most Dragonlords are at each other's throats to rise in their ranks and gain more power. No one would sit beside a possible rival, and no one would trust a possible rival to be seated next to them either.

So, the whole room was basically a huge round room, with the whole map of Valyria painted in the center, with many comfortable throne-like chairs that were spread across the room making a full circle around the map of Valyria in the center, but they were significantly spaced from one another, the only seats near those thrones were seats prepared for their own men. Each throne did however have its own small end tables with wine, fresh fruits and some other snacks nearby.

Kael could see a crowd of platinum-haired cunts all over the place, dressing in their most expensive clothes, almost like this was prom night and everyone around wanted to be voted the prom queen. He couldn't really complain since his own wardrobe was beyond extravagant, his casual clothes were more expensive than most of these people's "regal attire". As for colors? Everyone here seemed to love black, it was black and gold, black and silver, black and red, black and purple. Add a secondary color with black and you got yourself presentable clothing for the event!

'At least I'm mostly silver and red… well I do have some black but… eh… at least I wear three colors and black isn't the main one…' Kael chuckled.

"Where have you been? Did you get lost, my Lord?" Asked Valanar in a low tone, almost a whisper, but sarcastically. He couldn't help it, he would never do it out loud when in front of others and ruin the prestige of his Liege, even if they were best friends and would bicker at one another in private.

"You could've asked me to come with you Kael" said Vaela with a soft smile, she wore dressy clothes similar to his own, with the same patterns and colors, it seemed she really got into his new fashion style.

"It's alright, I saw a lot, learned a lot… can't say it was time wasted" Kael chuckled as he sat down on his own chair and grabbed some wine. "Let's just hope this will be interesting and not a complete waste of time."

As every Dragonlord was talking among their own inner circles, time slowly passed until the final one arrived, this one was an old man, slightly hunched with a long thick silvery beard, he wore pure black robes, just black. Details? Almost none could be seen since he wore a dark grey cloak over his shoulders that dragged on the floor below as he walked, the chain that tied his cloak in front of his chest was made with Valyrian steel though. He walked with a cane that looked milk-white, almost as if it was glowing under the sunlight. His long-braided hair of silver and strands of gold fell on his shoulders and back like a cape and his eyes were deep purple.

"I apologize for my lateness." He said as he slowly walked towards the one empty throne remaining in the room.

The low-ranked families kept paying attention to four particular individuals as the old man walked to his seat, and these three of these four individuals kept staring at Kael, who in turn kept staring daggers at the man with a deep frown while gripping the arm of his chair.

Vaela and Valanar got quite surprised by Kael's extreme reaction, he was always so calm and collected, what could possibly make him behave like this? But they decided to stay by him in silence considering that now every other lord was paying attention to him.

The first hour of the meeting was mainly the lower families bragging that they raised their ranks in the last decade or so, and how powerful they got since the last Conclave. While the ones that got weaker simply let their snarky remarks of how underhanded and untrustworthy those said families were, classical sore loser behavior.

Once that was over, the old man coughed to get everyone's attention and started talking about more personal matters.

"First I would like to offer my condolences to Lord of Regallyon for your loss, I met your Lord Father years back, he was an honorable and trustworthy man, I hope your family can remain strong even after his passing, I know how vital one person is to your family." He said with an amicable smile towards Kael, but most keep people could see his eyes narrowing.

Kael chuckled "I appreciate the sentiment Lord of Belaerys, even if it's a decade late, we are small yes, but united. I don't think you would understand… I'm talking about the family size, of course…" he grinned as he replied.

The silence remained for a few seconds until the old man said again "I've heard of what happened to you, Lord of Regallyon… a whole fortnight to recover, are you sure you are healthy enough? We can proceed to let you go back and rest if it's better for your health."

Kael laughed "Don't worry about it Lord of Belaerys, I'm pretty healthy… two families could attest to that, although only one remains in the Freehold. But you don't have to concern yourself, I'm young and have all the time in the world to recover if anything like that happens again."

"That's good then, would be a shame to lose such an important family in the Freehold due to some sickness or wicked magic, even if the said family has the least amount of members." He concluded and turned to some other Lord and they started to have their own talk, rudely ignoring Kael and giving him no chance to reply.

Both Vaela and Valanar frowned at that, they didn't know how or even when the Belaerys and Regallyon families became so antagonistic towards one another, it wasn't normal… and Kaelarys knew about it.

"Lord of Regallyon!" a gruff, extremely tall man with a strong build said, he had the classic Valyrian features but was dressed in sleeveless tunics that displayed thick arms, the man was comparable to the Mountain in Kael's eyes.

"How can I help you Lord of Telaeryen?" he answered back with a friendly smile.

"We appreciate your patronage of our shops, I would like to personally tell you that if you double the order from the last time for the amount of Valyrian Steel, I will personally give you a 10% discount, we can't just let such a good business opportunity with such an esteemed client die down because of greed, can we?"

Everyone looked at Kael and then towards Belaerys who was with his eyes slightly narrowed.

"Well, if you offer me so much, I'm sure going to accept the offer, I will let the taskmasters inside my mines know about it so they can start collecting the ores." Kael replied calmly with narrowed eyes.

"I'm curious Lord of Regallyon." Said a man, or a woman… honestly, people from the Celdarys family were all androgynous, you can't tell men from women unless you see what's between their legs. Kael will assume that it is a He because Valyrian laws prioritize males over females for the headship of the family.

"Hm" Kael acknowledged him.

"What are you doing with all of this Valyrian Steel? I've heard that you bought quite a large quantity of it, even your own armor."

Kael shrugged "We are a family based in magic, we use Valyrian steel for many things, as for the armor? I just wanted some, is there a problem with it? I mean… Lord Belaerys has more than a couple of them and no one is asking him questions, am I right?" He grinned. "But I'm curious as well Lord of Celdarys, why did you send some annoying bug to test me on the Western Water Gate some time ago?"

Lord of Celdarys frowned slightly but recovered very quickly, Kael noticed though as many others also did "I must ask your pardon Lord of Regallyon, because I don't really understand your question, what are you insinuating?"

Kael raised an eyebrow as gave him a soft smile "Nothing, it must be my mistake, but since it wasn't you, and it wasn't from Lord of Belaerys considering he has no reason to send small leeches to test me, and the other two families are on a good trading agreement with my family, I can assume that the shrimp came on his own, with that in mind then… I will just announce that the next maggot that comes to annoy me will be burned alive… that is… unless someone gives me a good reason to let them live?"

The hall was in silence, many Lords were amused, some were quite clueless, but some were frowning, if their backers don't speak up, they will suffer retaliation, but if their backers speak up… the whole point will be moot, Kael has them on check and he was smiling about it.

One of them though didn't get the message and stood up "You would be breaking the ancient laws of our Freehold if you started attacking and burning other equal families, the other families won't stand by when faced with such heinous disrespect!" he shouted.

Kael could see an annoyed expression on Celdarys' face and had to hold back his chuckle. "Well, if others come to my business seeking trouble on their own accord…they are already disrespecting the laws that you are so heroically trying to protect, and by the same laws… I can protect myself from such horrible acts…after all… it's not like someone is holding a knife to anyone's throat and commanding them to do so, is it?" his grin went wider as he turned to the loud man "And you are terribly mistaken Lord of… who cares... you and I are not equal."