Six moons before fire descended upon Dorne, Prince Daemon Targaryen had already begun to mistake restraint for weakness.
He stood within the yard of a half-built barracks in King's Landing, watching men drill beneath the gold cloaks he had forged through fear, discipline, and relentless purpose. Once they had been little better than street rabble carrying spears. Under him, they had become something sharper. Ordered lines replaced chaos. Commands were answered instantly. Steel moved in clean rhythm beneath the morning sun, and still it felt insufficient.
Not while every achievement of his life was weighed against a brother who ruled without ever needing to demand obedience.
Viserys.
The name lingered even unspoken—in lowered eyes, in the careful silence of captains waiting for his temper, in the quiet knowledge that no matter what Daemon built, another man was loved more easily. A gentler man. A weaker one, if Daemon allowed himself honesty. That bitterness never truly left him.
The City Watch had been his answer. If respect would not come willingly, fear would suffice. He had taken thieves, killers, and gutterborn men and forged them into an instrument sharp enough to carve order from chaos.
The city feared him for it.
But fear was fleeting. Reverence was not.
Beyond the walls of the Red Keep, Viserys remained beloved without effort, seated comfortably upon a throne Daemon believed required harder men to hold.
When envoys from Highgarden arrived beneath banners of green and gold, speaking of unrest along the Dornish marches, Daemon understood the truth before the council did.
They had not come seeking permission.
They had come seeking dragons.
The Small Council chamber smelled faintly of parchment and candle smoke as the Reachmen delivered their grievances—raids along the passes, caravans vanishing beneath the Red Mountains, keeps harried along the borderlands. Small wounds, perhaps, but wounds that refused to close.
Otto Hightower listened with folded hands and measured restraint. Viserys listened with sympathy. Daemon listened with contempt.
"A joint campaign," the envoy said carefully. "Swift and decisive. Highgarden stands ready to commit men if the Crown lends its strength."
Not war. Men rarely named it so until corpses forced honesty upon them.
"Dorne has ever been restless," Viserys said.
"And ever defiant," Daemon replied.
The chamber quieted.
Viserys turned his gaze on him. "Defiance alone does not justify war."
"Then what does?" Daemon asked. "Another generation of raids while we congratulate ourselves for choosing peace?"
Otto spoke before the king could. "Peace has preserved the realm longer than conquest ever has."
"A comforting lie," Daemon said.
Viserys raised a hand. "The realm has bled enough. I will not march south over wounded pride and border skirmishes."
"The Dornish will mistake caution for weakness."
"Let them," Viserys said. "So long as the realm remains at peace."
Peace. Such a pleasant word for surrender.
The council murmured its assent. Lord Strong spoke of stability. Grand Maester Mellos of cost and famine. Otto, as ever, of unity.
Always unity. Always caution.
When the decision was set, Viserys finally said, "No."
The Reach envoy bowed, disappointment carefully contained.
Viserys turned to his brother. "Daemon."
Whether warning or plea, it did not matter.
Daemon held his gaze for a long moment, then turned away without bow or leave. The chamber doors shut behind him with a finality that silenced the room.
The Tyrells sought him privately afterward.
Careful men. Dangerous men. Not openly rebellious, but close enough to test the edge of it.
They spoke first of Dorne—of raids along the marches, of a border that bled too often to ignore. But Daemon had already heard such concerns before. Years ago, when Viserys had first taken the throne, a letter from Highgarden had reached him in silence rather than ceremony. It spoke plainly: the Reach would not wait forever for the Crown's indecision to cost them their borders.
He had not forgotten it.
And neither, it seemed, had they.
Now, in the absence of the Crown's ear, their words shed what restraint remained. Less diplomacy. Less hesitation. Not a problem to endure, but a threat to be ended.
They only required a dragon to give it shape.
For a long while, Daemon said nothing.
He thought of Viserys seated upon a throne that asked little of him. Of the council mistaking caution for wisdom. Of himself—Commander of the City Watch, master of ten thousand cloaks, yet bound to a city that respected him only when it feared him.
Then he thought of Dorne.
A kingdom that had defied Aegon the Conqueror and still wore that defiance like a crown. A land that still believed dragons could bleed.
Something inside him tightened.
Not anger.
Purpose.
When he finally spoke, his voice was calm.
"I will not wait for permission," and in that moment, thought became intent.
Back in Sunspear, Princess Deria Martell stood upon the upper terrace and watched the horizon burn.
She had already seen the dragon.
Not as rumor, nor as some distant shape swallowed by smoke, but clearly—terribly—crossing the sky above the Shadow City. Vast red wings cut through ash and flame alike, so immense they seemed to darken the world beneath them. Nothing in its movement suggested strain. The creature did not battle the wind. It ruled it.
That sight refused to leave her.
Below, panic spread faster than the fire.
The sky above the Shadow City had turned a bruised crimson, too dark for sunset and too deliberate for any ordinary blaze. Smoke climbed in heavy columns until the horizon itself appeared to break apart.
Guards shouted over one another. Servants whispered prayers. Reports arrived in fragments—districts aflame, streets collapsing beneath dragonfire, the harbor drowning in chaos.
Princess Deria raised one hand. Silence followed at once.
"Confirm it," she said.
No one moved.
Not out of defiance—out of hesitation, as if naming it would make it true.
Princess Deria did not need confirmation anyway.
She had seen it herself.
From the terrace, the destruction below was not chaos. It moved with intent, block by block, swallowing the Shadow City street by street.
Not wildfire.
Dragonfire.
"A Targaryen is here," she said quietly. "Open the vault."
They had not preserved it out of pride—only because it was remembered.
Beneath Sunspear, the old weapon was hauled up piece by piece, as if even the earth resisted giving it up. Men carried each section with careful hands, not in reverence, but in the quiet discomfort of handling something meant to stay buried.
Every timber and iron brace carried the weight of another age. Ancient runes scarred its surface, worn nearly smooth by time. A great scorpion forged in the years after Meraxes fell above Hellholt.
The weapon that had killed a dragon. The weapon that had saved Dorne.
No one needed to say its history. Every Dornishman knew it.
When the final piece locked into place, the courtyard seemed to grow heavier. Even the air tightened around it.
Blackened bolts were brought forward next, their surfaces etched with symbols no living maester could read.
Deria descended into the courtyard herself.
That unsettled the men more than the weapon did.
Princesses did not oversee siege engines.
But this was not just a weapon. It was inheritance.
"Where are the house members?" she asked Nolan, who was leading the men.
"Grandmother, the two princesses and Maris are in the secret chambers protected by the household guards. Qhorys and Qoren, including other houses, are defending the front lines," he said.
"Good. We knew this was unexpected. But Dorne won't bend its knee," she said casually as she looked far above Sunspear, where Caraxes cut through smoke and fire, long and crimson against the burning sky.
For the first time since the attack began, hope stirred within her.
The kind born from survival.
Meraxes had fallen here before; she had even delivered its head to the Iron Throne. Dragons could die.
"Ready the shot," Princess Deria ordered.
The great scorpion groaned as it turned skyward.
A soldier hesitated at the winch. Princess Deria gave a single nod.
"Loose it."
The bolt screamed upward.
High above the city, Daemon Targaryen sensed it before he saw it. Years upon Caraxes had taught him the shape of danger in the sky. The air shifted differently around threats.
Then he saw it climbing through the smoke beneath them.
For the briefest instant, surprise touched his face.
Then he laughed.
A scorpion. Not some crude siege engine dragged from desperation, but something older. Purpose-built. Dornish, of course.
Even from this height, he understood what they were attempting. Another impossible shot. Another dragon brought down over Dorne.
Another Meraxes.
The bolt tore upward through smoke and flame.
Caraxes twisted aside effortlessly.
The projectile passed harmlessly through empty sky behind them.
Daemon looked down toward Sunspear, imagining the silence that must have followed below.
A grin spread slowly across his face.
"So that is your answer," he murmured.
Beneath him, the Shadow City burned.
Daemon rested one hand against Caraxes's neck.
"Dracarys."
Caraxes answered with fire.
Dragonflame descended in a vast torrent, swallowing rooftops and narrow streets alike. Towers vanished behind waves of heat and smoke as entire sections of the city collapsed inward.
Far below, Princess Deria watched the flames spread and felt the first doubt slip in.
"Reload."
The second bolt came faster.
This shot was better aimed—fired not where Caraxes was, but where they believed he would be.
It did not matter. The Blood Wyrm moved through the sky with terrifying speed, weaving through smoke and ash before the bolt ever reached him.
Again, it missed.
Daemon's smile widened.
The old stories had poisoned them. Dorne still believed dragons could be challenged and lived through.
Another torrent of flame descended upon the Shadow City. Streets vanished beneath fire. Stone cracked from heat. Men disappeared screaming beneath collapsing roofs.
Below, silence settled around the great scorpion.
Not fear. Disbelief.
Deria felt it too—cold, sharp, unwelcome.
The weapon that had once saved Dorne would not reach this dragon.
Still, she gave the order.
"Again."
The third bolt was loaded with trembling hands.
By then everyone understood the truth, though none dared speak it aloud. The old answer no longer belonged to this war.
The final shot launched skyward.
Daemon barely glanced at it. He understood them now—they were not firing from belief anymore, only desperation.
Caraxes surged forward, and the bolt slipped past into the smoke behind them, harmless.
Meaningless.
Silence settled over Sunspear. Not power, not courage, not strategy—just speed.
The dragon had already moved beyond the reach of the old world.
Deria's hand tightened around the stone railing until cracks spread beneath her fingers.
For generations, Dorne's pride had rested upon one truth: dragons could fall.
Now she understood the deeper truth hidden beneath that legend.
Meraxes had died because Dorne had been granted one impossible chance.
Caraxes would not offer another.
And worse still, the dragon was only part of the invasion.
That realization settled over her like cold iron.
Dorne had prepared for the Reach. For centuries House Martell had survived through patience, attrition, and the land itself. Scorched roads. Poisoned wells. Ambushes in the passes. Let invaders march deeper until thirst and exhaustion destroyed them.
The Reachmen could have been bled dry beneath the Dornish sun.
But dragons ruined distance.
They ruined preparation.
An army crossing the passes might take weeks. A dragon crossed the same distance within hours. Hidden supply caches, fortified positions, carefully prepared kill zones—none of it mattered when fire could descend from the sky before scouts even returned with warning.
Every strategy Dorne possessed relied upon the enemy moving like men.
Daemon Targaryen did not move like a man.
And while Caraxes burned the Shadow City from above, the armies of the Reach marched safely beneath that shadow.
That was the truth Deria could no longer deny.
Had this been only the Reach, Dorne might have endured—but a dragonlord had come with them, and Dorne could not face that alone.
Her gaze drifted toward the lower vaults beneath Sunspear.
There were still answers hidden there—forbidden ones.
The thought settled heavy in her chest.
She could use it. End this before the fire spread farther across Dorne.
But the old warnings were clear. If that artifact awakened within Sunspear, there might not be much of Sunspear left afterward.
For the first time that night, hesitation touched her.
Then her fingers brushed against the necklace on her neck, hoping the artifact who gave her longer life would answer her pleas.
Princess Deria froze upon touching the second necklace.
Memory surfaced quietly. A promise made a year ago, before the prelude of invasion occurred and war had hardened everything around her.
The necklace felt unnaturally cold.
Few within Sunspear knew it existed. Fewer understood what it truly meant.
Not authority. Not power. A call. A pact.
Deria closed her hand around it and hesitated.
Somewhere far from Sunspear, the one bound to that pact had chosen seclusion over kingdoms and war.
But below her, the Shadow City drowned in dragonfire, and more lives vanished with every passing breath.
Deria tightened her grip and crushed the bead within the necklace.
The sound was almost nothing, but somewhere beyond the burning coast, something heard it.
Far along the western shores of Salt Shore, the watchtowers of House Peverell answered with warning fires of their own.
The sea had darkened with sails.
A household guard atop the western walls saw them first—shapes emerging from the Summer Sea in impossible numbers until the horizon itself vanished behind masts and canvas.
Within moments, alarm bells rang across the harbor.
Esteban climbed the battlements and ordered full readiness.
By the time he reached the top, he understood why the men below had gone pale.
Hundreds of sails filled the horizon. Not trade colors. Not pirate rags. Formations—tight, ordered. A war fleet.
For a long while, he stared silently across the water while the sea wind pulled at his cloak.
His expression tightened.
"Send word to House Gargalen," he ordered. "Salt Shore stands until Lord Peverell returns."
The men obeyed immediately, though fear remained plain in their faces.
Esteban understood why.
Castle Peverell held only a thousand household guards. Enough for raiders. Enough for border skirmishes.
Not this.
Not if the fleet chose Salt Shore for landing.
His gaze remained fixed upon the approaching armada.
He knew where Thaddues had gone after vanishing from the castle.
For the first time since the war began, Esteban found himself wondering whether even his lord, Thaddues could truly stop what was coming.
TBC
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