Thaddues arrived at the palace wall of Sunspear beneath a sky that no longer resembled evening.
The heavens above Dorne had turned red.
Smoke rolled across the city in suffocating waves, thick enough to swallow towers whole. Dragonfire spread through the Shadow City below like living judgment, devouring rooftops, market stalls, narrow alleys, and every fragile thing men had spent generations building with their hands. Screams rose beneath the roar of flame, blending into a single sound that no longer felt human.
The heat struck even the palace heights.
From the walls, Thaddues could see entire streets collapsing inward. Wooden beams burst apart in showers of sparks while terrified crowds pushed through pathways already choked with smoke. Mothers dragged children through burning courtyards. Men formed desperate lines carrying water that evaporated before it touched the stone.
Above all of it circled death.
Caraxes moved through the sky like something born from war itself. The Blood Wyrm's long crimson body twisted through smoke and fire with horrifying grace, each movement followed by another torrent of flame crashing into the city below.
Thaddues stood motionless as he watched.
This was never supposed to involve him.
Dorne was not his kingdom. Sunspear was not his home. The politics of princes and dragons had never been his concern, and he had spent the last year keeping it that way. Salt Shore had prospered precisely because he stayed distant from crowns, wars, and ambitions.
But what Daemon Targaryen was doing below was no longer conquest.
It was slaughter.
And Thaddues found, to his irritation, that he could not simply watch it happen.
His hand tightened slightly around his wand.
Then he stepped forward onto the edge of the palace wall.
"Targaryen," he called.
Magic moved through the word before it ever left his mouth.
The charm carried his voice across the burning city, amplifying it until it cut through the chaos below with impossible clarity.
"Leave Sunspear."
Far above, Caraxes shifted mid-flight.
The dragon's massive head turned sharply and atop the beast, Daemon Targaryen looked down.
Even from that distance, Thaddues saw surprise cross the prince's face before it settled into interest.
The Targaryen Prince guided Caraxes into a wide descending circle, smoke spiraling around the dragon's wings as the beast lowered itself toward the palace district. Each beat of those enormous wings sent ash scattering through the air.
Then Caraxes landed. The impact shook the avenue below the palace walls hard enough to crack stone. Nearby buildings collapsed from the force alone. Heat rolled outward in suffocating waves as the dragon lowered its long neck, teeth bared behind strands of smoke.
Daemon dismounted slowly.
Dark armor reflected the glow of the burning city around him. His silver hair stirred in the heated wind while one hand rested casually upon Dark Sister at his hip.
"So," Daemon said, studying the man standing above him. "You're the sorcerer."
Thaddues' expression barely shifted.
"I'm a wizard," he corrected. He then waved his wand, and magic surged outward.
The fire surrounding the palace district twisted violently. Flames bent away from nearby homes as though seized by invisible hands. Burning rooftops hissed beneath waves of dispersing magic before entire sections of fire vanished altogether.
The avenue between them darkened as the inferno abruptly died.
Daemon watched the display carefully.
Then he laughed once.
"A wizard," Daemon repeated, amused. "The letter mentioned one. I assumed the Dornish were exaggerating." His eyes flicked briefly toward the extinguished flames before returning to Thaddues. "Clearly not."
Thaddues ignored the remark.
"Leave Sunspear, Targaryen."
His voice remained calm, but inwardly his thoughts churned.
He did not want this fight. More importantly, he did not want what came after it.
Hurting Daemon Targaryen would not end with Daemon. It would invite the Iron Throne itself into Dorne. Kings remembered humiliation. Dragons remembered injury. Even victory here could become catastrophe later.
That was the problem with powerful men in westeros. Defeating them was often easier than surviving the consequences.
Daemon's amusement faded slightly.
"I cannot."
The words came without hesitation.
"You stand in my conquest," he continued, gaze narrowing. "That is either courage or ignorance."
Thaddues met his eyes evenly.
"I'm not here for conquest."
Daemon smirked faintly.
"Then you are already behind." he said and his hand brushed across Caraxes' neck.
"Dracarys."
The dragon roared.
The sound hit like a physical force, warping the air itself. Heat exploded from Caraxes' jaws as dragonfire erupted downward in a flood bright enough to drown the entire avenue in red.
Most men would have fled.
Thaddues stepped forward instead.
A protection barrier erupted before him. Dragonfire slammed against the shield with enough force to crater the stone beneath his feet. The impact thundered through the palace walls, flames spilling outward around the magical barrier in violent waves but they did not pass through. The fire warped and shattered apart.
Thaddues raised his wand again. Water making charm surged outward in all directions. The inferno vanished—not diminished, erased.
Steam smoke spiraled upward as the avenue suddenly cooled, leaving only scorched stone and stunned silence behind.
For the first time since landing, Daemon's expression shifted from amusement into genuine fascination. He mounted Caraxes again.
Then he smiled again.
This time it looked dangerous.
The battle began without another word.
Caraxes lunged first.
The dragon launched upward with terrifying speed before diving toward the palace walls in a blur of crimson scales and flame. Daemon understood warfare instinctively; he did not waste time probing cautiously when overwhelming force could end matters immediately.
Fire engulfed the battlements.
Stone exploded beneath the dragon's claws.
Thaddues apparated away an instant before impact, reappearing atop a nearby tower as debris rained below him.
Caraxes twisted midair with unnatural flexibility for something so enormous.
Another torrent of dragonfire erupted toward him.
Thaddues swung his wand in a sharp arc.
The flames split apart around him.
Instead of colliding with the tower, the fire curved sideways, redirected harmlessly into the empty sky beyond Sunspear.
Daemon's eyes narrowed.
Interesting.
The Targaryen Prince drew Dark Sister as Caraxes swept lower again. This time Daemon himself leapt from the saddle during the pass, landing atop the tower with impossible precision.
Valyrian steel flashed immediately.
Thaddues blocked instinctively. His wand turning into a silver sword.
Burst of sparks as the transfigured wand intercepted the blade inches from his throat. The impact forced Thaddues backward across the rooftop. He sighed, his frail body would never win in close combat.
Daemon pressed relentlessly.
Every strike flowed into the next with brutal elegance. He fought like a man born for violence, his swordsmanship precise enough that hesitation became lethal within seconds.
Thaddues defended carefully. Turning the transfigured blade back into his wand, he deflected every strike from Daemon.
He could have responded differently.
A dozen spells crossed his mind at once—binding curses, transfigurations, magic that could end the duel outright. Yet each path led to the same outcome: a dead prince, inevitable retaliation, and war.
So he held them back, forcing restraint where instinct pushed for violence.
Daemon noticed.
Their clash continued across the rooftop while fire illuminated the city below. Dark Sister carved through stone whenever Thaddues narrowly avoided its edge. Spells flashed in rapid succession, not offensive but defensive—shields, redirections, bursts of force meant only to create distance.
"You hold back," Daemon observed sharply between strikes.
Thaddues said nothing.
That answer proved enough.
Daemon attacked harder.
Caraxes descended again behind him, unleashing another wave of flame toward the surrounding district. Civilians still trapped below screamed as rooftops ignited once more.
Thaddues' attention shifted instinctively toward the fire and Daemon immediately exploited it.
Dark Sister cut across his shoulder.
The blade should have drawn blood, but the protection runes woven into Thaddues' robes prevented it. Daemon was stunned. Thaddues used it to forced the prince backward with a levitation charm.
Daemon smiled.
"Interesting magic."
Thaddues ignored him entirely.
Instead, he turned toward the burning district below and raised his wand again. A water making spell surged outward in expanding waves, extinguishing entire rows of fire before they could spread deeper into the city.
Daemon stared at him for half a second, disbelieving. Even in the middle of a battle, the wizard was thinking of civilians—not himself, not victory. Them.
That alone bothered Daemon more than any resistance would have.
"You could fight properly," the prince called as Caraxes circled overhead once more. "But you waste yourself saving rubble and strangers."
Thaddues did not turn around.
"I'm trying not to make this worse."
Daemon laughed sharply.
"It is already worse."
Caraxes descended again.
This time the dragon crashed directly through the avenue separating the palace from the lower terraces. Buildings collapsed instantly beneath the creature's weight while fire spread through the impact zone in all directions.
The city trembled.
Dust and smoke consumed everything.
Through it all, Thaddues moved constantly. Apparition cracked through the battlefield in rapid succession as he pulled survivors from collapsing homes and extinguishing infernos with waves of conjured water. Buildings steadied seconds before collapse as Thaddues cast one spell after another, each demanding perfect control.
He fought like a man attempting to hold back a flood with his bare hands and still he refused to attack directly.
Hours passed like that—flame, smoke, magic, steel. Again and again, Caraxes dove over Sunspear, and each time Thaddues met it with the same impossible restraint. Streets stayed standing only because he chose containment over retaliation. And every time Daemon pressed harder, the wizard answered not with destruction, but with tighter control.
That was when Daemon finally understood what unsettled him. The wizard's danger lay in his restraint. A lesser man would have lashed out by now. This one did not—not from weakness, but from control.
Daemon guided Caraxes into another pass through the city, watching carefully this time. The dragon's fire struck a collapsing district near the Shadow City walls—and immediately Thaddues apparated there instead of pursuing him.
Again, it was always the civilians first.
The realization settled in Daemon's mind slowly. He could not end this quickly—perhaps not at all. Worse, even Caraxes showed signs of strain. The Blood Wyrm remained monstrous, but even dragons had limits, and hours of fire and maneuvering had begun to dull its movements.
Below, the wizard still held. Not untouched, but steady.
Daemon looked across the burning city and understood another truth. Dorne had already seen enough. Fear had been delivered.
Sunspear burned. The Shadow City burned. The people of Dorne would remember dragonfire for generations after tonight, whether the city fully fell or not.
Complete destruction was no longer necessary.
Especially not against an opponent whose full capabilities remained uncertain.
As Caraxes landed atop a ruined terrace once more, Daemon regarded Thaddues carefully through drifting smoke.
"This is not finished," he said.
Thaddues stood amid extinguished fire, robes darkened with soot and blood from the survivors.
He did not answer.
For several long moments the two men simply stared at one another across the devastation.
Then Caraxes unfurled his wings.
The dragon rose back into the smoke-filled sky before turning eastward, disappearing gradually beyond the burning horizon.
Only after the beast vanished did the city begin to breathe again.
Silence spread through Sunspear—not peace, but exhaustion.
Thaddues lowered his wand and turned toward the streets below. The work was not over. Not even close.
He moved through the city for the rest of the night, street by street. Flames died wherever he passed. Cracked buildings steadied under reinforcing charms, and trapped civilians were drawn from rubble with careful motions of magic.
By dawn, the worst of the inferno had begun to fade. Nothing remained untouched. The Shadow City lay mutilated. Entire districts had collapsed into blackened ruin, smoke still rising from broken homes. Bodies lay under hastily gathered sheets, grief too heavy for words.
Sunspear had endured—but endurance carried its own scars.
Later, atop the upper terraces of the old palace, Thaddues stood beside Princess Deria Martell overlooking what remained of the city.
Between them rested the shattered remains of the ancient scorpion weapon once used against Meraxes generations ago. Its massive frame had splintered apart during the assault, ancient runes cracked beyond recognition.
Thaddues studied the fragments quietly.
The weapon fascinated him despite himself.
A construct capable of killing a dragon was not something easily ignored.
"We cannot rely on history anymore," Deria said at last.
Her voice carried exhaustion beneath its anger.
"No," Thaddues replied softly. "Only on what remains."
She looked toward him.
"And what remains?"
Thaddues' gaze shifted downward toward the city below.
People still moved through the ruins.
Men cleared rubble from collapsed streets, while women carried water through smoke-blackened alleys and children helped raise walls still warm from fire.
Broken. Exhausted. Rebuilding.
"Enough," he answered.
It was not comfort.
Only truth.
That made it more valuable.
Footsteps approached quickly behind them.
Princess Dareya arrived with his father Prince Nolan.
"Lord Thaddues," Fear still visible in her voice, she was clearly shaken by what happened to day.
"We thank Lord Thaddues for stepping in today," Prince Nolan said. He admitted that without Thaddues' intervention, Sunspear might already have bent the knee to the Iron Throne. They had only survived the assault because of him.
"If you must thank anyone, thank the ones still standing," Thaddues said quietly, an unfamiliar uneasiness stirring in his chest. He ignored it, assuming it was only a reaction to the chaos Daemon had brought to Sunspear. "They're the reason Sunspear survived."
Another footsteps approach them. A household guard entered the terrace breathing heavily, fury written plainly across his face.
"Princess Deria," he said, voice strained, standing before Prince Nolan and the others. "The Targaryen Prince hasn't stopped at Sunspear. The nearby towns are burning too—every settlement in their path is being put to the torch."
Deria's hands clenched.
"Madness," she spat. "Those damned Targaryens bring dragons into war as though the world exists only for them to destroy."
Thaddues frowned. He had hoped Daemon's withdrawal meant the attack would end here. It didn't.
"I'll go," he said quietly.
Deria looked at him sharply. "You've already done enough."
"Not yet."
He couldn't ignore it now. Not after seeing Sunspear.
"Take care Lord Peverell, " Princess Dareya said, Thaddues nodded at her and moved with the household guards, departing to the nearest burning town.
Deria watched the heir follow the departing carriage carrying Thaddues and smiled as another idea formed in her mind.
Over the next two days, Thaddues moved across Dorne relentlessly.
Because apparition required familiarity, travel slowed him more than he liked. Still, he crossed settlement after settlement extinguishing dragonfire before entire towns vanished beneath it. Homes were repaired where possible. Survivors were healed using his own brewed potion kept in his charmed pouch.
He even encountered battlefields with Tyrells and Martells, but he never interfered. He only provided potions to heal their wounds.
Everywhere he went, the same expressions met him—fear, shock, relief. By the second day, the fires had finally begun to die down. Still, the uneasiness didn't fade.
Then exhaustion begin pressing against him. So he returned home—or at least, he meant to.
The first thing Thaddues noticed after apparating near the Castle of Peverell was the smell carried by the wind. Blood, not smoke. His gaze sharpened at once, the thought of another burning settlement flickering through his mind.
Then he saw it in the distance—The White Market, now a single stretch of ruin. The noise reached him seconds later—steel clashing, voices breaking, chaos spilling through the streets.
He apparated immediately toward it.
When he arrived, the fighting was already swallowing the town.
But it all dulled the moment his eyes found her.
Lily.
In Sunspear, he had felt it and dismissed it while saving strangers, assuming it was only the weight of the situation. Now he understood it had been a warning—something irreplaceable had been left unguarded while he chose restraint elsewhere.
It took him a moment to understand what he was seeing. Isolde knelt amid shattered stone and blood-soaked ground, holding Lily against her chest with a desperation that had not yet turned into grief. Around them, the streets lay in ruins, as if the invasion had ripped straight through the heart of the town.
Lily didn't move.
She should have.
Thaddues froze. The thought broke before it could finish. She was meant to be alive. Instead, there was only silence.
He apparated again—reappearing just a few feet away. The battle faded behind him, swallowed by the narrowing space between them. Blood darkened the broken stone beneath his feet, spreading without urgency.
But it wasn't the blood that broke him. It was the absence his magic felt.
His hands tightened at his sides, trembling.
For a moment, there was nothing—only a blank, unbearable stillness.
Then something inside him stopped asking why.
"No," he said. His voice barely held at first. "Not again."
TBC
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