101
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298 AC
Summer Isles - The Cove
Eragon Targaryen
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Did she get taller?
She grew her hair out.
I think somehow her butt also got bigger.
Is she sniffing me?
My eyes widen when I also smell her and she has a floral scent to her.
"Are you smelling me?" She giggles and I shake my head since she was the one who did it first.
"Yes." She lightly smacks my chest and pulls back as she looks up into my eyes.
"I see you have gotten bolder, wonder what could have caused that." She peeks at Visenya before giving a small smile to her.
I gesture to one of the chairs around the table and she takes a seat, the people who accompanied her also move to sit around the table. Good thing this is a massive table with plenty of chairs or some people would have to stand.
For some reason the other guests all sat as far away from me as they could, scratching Arraxs chin I wonder why that could be the case.
"Eragon, how did you get dragons? You told me they were all dead and only bones and stone eggs remained behind." I slide back into my seat in between Visenya and Nata, the table slowly fills up as everyone moves to sit down.
"I burned myself alive and lived, dragons came back during that." She scrunches her brows and looks over at Melisandre who is sitting up straight and listening in.
"Did you convince him to jump into some stupid fire for your god?" Nata seems pretty upset and it catches everyone a bit off guard. Her mood swapped so fast it surprised everyone here but Melisandre recovered quickly.
"I asked nothing of my Prince and only helped him when he asked, he did everything of his own will and I didn't even have a chance to try to convince him of anything. He lead the charge on the ritual and managed to father seven dragons from seven stone eggs." Nata nods and turns to face me with an incredulous look.
"You just decided to burn yourself and hope it all worked out?" Her words sting a bit when she asks them like that but they're not entirely wrong.
"I walk into fire and I sail to the Summer Isles, I do things that many would see as... foolish but I have confidence." She takes a deep breath and sighs.
"Sorry, I just don't know how to react to the idea you tried to kill yourself using fire. You are fine and you will hopefully be staying that way, let's move on." She looks over to the other Summer Islanders who are looking at me with wide eyes. "These are some of the Chiefs and Chieftesses who survived pirate attacks and are combining their forces to attack back. They know the basic idea that you want to assist and they want to discuss terms with you." I nod and look each of them in the eye and see their mood become more solemn.
"We all only want to know one thing." One of the chiefs speaks up, he wears red and green feathers and laces his fingers together on the table in front of himself. "What is it that you want, we want to hear the truth of the matter." I hesitate for a moment before closing my eyes and taking a deep breath.
"I want the Summer Isles." I exhale and open my eyes again while looking into the eyes of the chief.
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298 AC
Beyond the wall
Lagertha
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I open my eyes and feel myself return to my own body, my hand clenching Dark sister sending a wave of comfort through me. The more I watch the more I learn but I also feel a slow change, something I can't see but can feel.
I stand up and push off the weirwood tree and pull Dark sister out of its sheath, exposing the smoky metal to the cold air. Out of all of the Wielders of this blade and all the stories it holds it ends up in my hands. I feel an odd sense of responsibility to the blade, maybe this is what the raven meant by not going too deep on one thing.
I shake my head and sheath the blade, regardless of any 'responsibility' I might feel I can't do anything if we don't make it back. I need to Warg a bird and scout ahead while we warm up at this fire Geor made.
Well, he needs to warm up, since connecting to the tree I feel the cold even less than I did before. I would be concerned if my body wasn't still hot to the touch as if I was freshly warmed by a fire.
Watching the flames my hand finds itself in my bag and on the last gift from the raven, something that will help me greatly if things play out properly. The chances of it going properly though are still up in the air and I need to focus and not mess anything up.
If the man I saw, Eragon Targaryen can make it work with so many of them then surely I can make it work with one.
I take my hand out of the bag and slap Geor on the shoulder.
"Let's get moving, we don't have much longer to go and you can finally try and steal that woman you keep thinking about. If you don't I might just steal her to piss you off, I didn't put up with all your groaning and complaining all this time for you to sit on your hands." He snorts and kicks some snow over the fire as he rises to his full height and cracks his neck.
"I will show you something, I will walk right in and toss the bitch over my shoulder." I shake my head as he slings his bag on and makes his way toward our destination.
Not much longer and I will be able to make my move, a move that can end with my death at any time. But I can't stop smiling when I think about it, seeing the places with my own eyes instead of through the trees has me very excited. Meeting the people I know but have never spoken with, I wonder if they will think I am a freak if I told them I know them.
Whatever, I will figure it out when I get to that point.
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298 AC
Volon Therys
Cirilla Blackfyre
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I can't believe Daemon wouldn't let me go to the meeting.
"Why does he have to make everything so personal, I get he is easily ruffled and I have ruffled him plenty to piss him off but seriously. We are the Blackfyres and he treats me like I am his enemy, I should be there to watch his back. I could give him insights that his 'council' wouldn't, I can help him broaden his view but instead, he leaves me behind." Helaena nods and continues to brush her hair as she watches me pace back and forth.
"He can't be seen to be weak, you make him look weak when you question him and that is bad in front of the Golden Company. You already know this but Daemon is genuinely worried he will get a knife in the neck and one of the men in the Golden company will 'claim' me and you and have us give him Blackfyres. This way they can push their kid onto a throne and not Daemon who many of them don't respect." My nose scrunches hearing my sweet sister talk about the cruel reality of our situation.
Only our fathers 'never ending' wealth is what affords us the life we have and it is on a thin rope. The support we have has died quite a bit with the Targaryens also taking a big hit, even if we are separate houses. With all the lost rebellions added on to the ones we wanted to replace being replaced, we are in a bad position. 'Father' is the only reason we even still have the Golden Company and we are counting blessings Helaena didn't actually have to marry a Khal.
The sham wedding was a miracle and I could also be forced to marry but through fathers efforts, we have been 'saved' to be used at a later date. To be sent to more valuable Lords to secure support in the actual lands of Westeros.
Father has been trying to marry Daemon to a Tyrell who is called their golden rose. With the Tyrells we would have the Reach and that would be a powerful start to the 'real' war. Add our forces to the Tyrells and we have one of the biggest forces, even if the other kingdoms band together it will still be close in numbers but it's unlikely.
Iron islanders hate everyone and Dorne is as good as independent with the Targaryens nesting in Sunspear. That's forty thousand troops counted out with just those two, if any more of the kingdoms pull out then we will have more men by a good amount with the Tyrell's backing.
But who knows if that marriage will even go through or not?
I drop onto Helaena's bed and sigh loudly.
"Calm your mind, we will be setting off soon and when we arrive the real stress will start to build up." I close my eyes and listen to her advice as I think about calming thoughts.
"Do you think we should just run off?" I ask in a joking manner and she hums as she gives it 'thought'.
"Maybe later, right now I am waiting on something and we can't leave until after that." I sit up and look at her questioningly.
"What do you mean, you actually do want to run off?" She shakes her head and looks away from me.
"I was joking Ciri, but we are waiting on something." I fall back onto the bed and wonder what she could be talking about.
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298 AC
Summer Isles - The Cove
Eragon Targaryen
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"You really do smell good, it is a more mature smell compared to how you used to smell." Nata leans in her seat to sniff at me and I shake my head and bite back a laugh.
"Are you a hound?" She smiles and sits back in her seat.
"No, I just remembered how you used to smell and like the new way you smell." The meeting went far better than I expected it to, and they agreed.
I didn't want to beat around the bush too much, they obviously knew why I was here, and directly lying to them could have ruined their opinions of me. So I came out and said it and although they looked a bit uncomfortable none of them were vocal against the idea.
They were hesitant to accept even when we would help them with the pirates but Nata helped sell them to the idea. They didn't want their home to completely fall under someone not even born here and she fixed that problem.
She will marry me and represent the Summer Islanders by being a Summer Islander and also a queen of the Summer Isles. I also went on about how my kids by her would most likely be dragon riders and they would sit on the 'throne' of the Summer Isles once I pass it down. So even when I take more lands in the future my children from Nata will be the ones directly in control of the Summer Isles.
They seemed a lot more enthusiastic about the idea once I told them that, it was always the plan if I ended up marrying Nata. But you can never know something for sure until it's actually happening and now that this is happening it seems more 'real' than when I was thinking about it sitting in Braavos.
In the future depending on how much land I end up taking the Summer Isles will be made into a Principality and that may include some surrounding islands as well. So similar to how Dorne is a Principality and the Martells are Princes and Princesses of Dorne even though it's under the Iron Throne.
Things can change but that's the plan I sold to the Chiefs and Chieftesses to get them on board and they agreed and now we will have their support in challenging the Summer prince of Ebonhead. One step at a time and we will slowly expand from here, I lick my lips feeling them feel dry, and look around the table.
I had already informed everyone on my side of my idea and we discussed it at great length and finally agreed that it would work for now. Things can always still change, especially when the dragons are big enough to make people bend the knee even if they don't want to.