Capítulo 33: Befriending a Dragoness
After the last joust the tourney came to an end. That afternoon, while the lords celebrated at the Red Keep, the peasants dismantled the jousting grounds, stalls and tents. By the time dawn broke, Doran was surprised to see how little remained on the banks of the river.
There were only a few tents left belonging to some minor lord or knight who were too irrelevant to be invited to stay in the Red Keep, and they couldn't find an available inn.
The chaos of the Tourney attracted thousands of people and all the inns were filled with customers.
`The city, and the crown, earned more coins than they spent on the tourney.`
During his walks through the city in the last week the prince spoke with people from places as far away as Bear Island. From mercenaries to minstrels, all kinds of people came to King's Landing. And many of them won more coins than they could carry, only to lose them gambling or spending them on luxuries or whores.
In the end the coffers of House Targaryen were filled with gold. Doran finally understands how tourneys work.
`They are an investment, something like carnivals in my old world. The organizers spend money to set up the rides and stalls, but they end up earning much more than they spend.`
In Dorne tourneys are not as common as in places like the Reach, not for lack of knights and lords but because of the deserts. Tourneys depend on people, on them traveling to where they take place; and few people dare to travel through deserts. So the tourneys are few in Dorne and only to celebrate big occasions, but that also means that the tourneys held in Dorne are more grandiose compared to the others.
The Reach for example holds tourneys every other day but most of them are small and the rewards of the contests do not exceed 100 gold coins. Those tourneys only attract wandering knights and poor people in general. Rarely are tourneys held with rewards large enough to attract knights of renown.
Dorne, holding so few tourneys, when they do hold them the rewards are substantial and knights from as far away as the Vale travel there. Dorne is famous for not holding tourneys with rewards of less than 1,000 golden dragons.
Doran recalls the Tourney held in honor of his grandmother some time ago, the rewards being 5,000 golden dragons for the winner of the joust and 2,500 for the second place. The melee winner got 3,000 golden dragons and the archery winner 2,000. Doran was still too young to attend the tourney, something he regrets.
After observing his first tourney up close, the prince can say with certainty that he will become a knight so that he can participate in them when he is older.
`But under who should I squire?` He asks himself with a thoughtful face. In his family there are many renowned knights, his father is one of the best swordsmen in the Known World and his great-uncle, Arron Martell, is the Best Spear of Westeros; Both would be good options but Doran doesn't want the knights he learns from to be family.
The prince fears that his relatives will pamper him, something that Doran does not like; he wants to live the authentic experience of a squire.
Doran leaves the grounds where the Tourney was held and returns to the castle, Lothar behind him.
Along the way he thinks of the perfect knight to mentor him.
`He has to be skillful, and the most important thing is that he doesn't care about my title and treats me like a true squire.`
As he walks he sees Princess Rhaella walking somewhat sullenly, with Ser Gerold trailing behind her.
`I've had enough interactions with most of the House Targaryens to get a sense of their personalities. The only one I didn't get to have a real conversation with is Rhaella. This may be my last chance.`
As a task, his grandmother told him to observe all the important figures, to get an idea of their personalities and ambitions. And Doran doesn't want to fail in his task so he approaches the elusive princess.
"Oh? Princess Rhaella?" Doran greets her and walks towards her at a brisk pace. The princess looks at him in surprise, like a fawn in the headlights of a car.
Doran notices that the princess seems to want to be anywhere but here, alone with him in a deserted hallway.
`Well our knights are here, but they could as well be statues` In this world servants are silent as mice, they don't speak unless they have something important to say or you speak to them. Something that Doran appreciates since it eliminates awkward small talk.
"Your grace, would you mind joining me for a walk through the gardens?" Doran gives her his best smile. And to top it off he adds the puppy eyes that got him out of most trouble: "Tomorrow we're leaving the capital and I'd like to take one last walk through the gardens, would you be so kind as to accompany me?"
"Yes, Prince Doran." In the end the princess relents and they walk towards the gardens together, Rhaella giving him wary glances while Doran tries to make conversation.
"It's a beautiful flower," he said looking at the pale white petals of a nearby flower.
"It's a Moonbloom from Oldtown," she said, touching its petals. "It was a nameday gift for aunt Jenny from uncle Duncan."
"Oh? Princess Jenny likes flowers a lot right?" asks Doran, having noticed that Jenny always has one or another flower as a decoration in her hair.
"Princess?" Rhaella looks at him puzzled.
"That's what she is, right?" Says Doran, "She married a prince, which makes her a princess. Or am I wrong?" Doran is pretty sure he's right, in his world when someone marries a prince they become a princess. The same thing happened here, when his father married his mother he became Prince Trystanne, the same thing happened with his grandfather. No one calls them Lord Trystanne or Lord Arthur, their official titles are Prince.
When Betha Blackwood married the then Prince Aegon received the title of princess, people no longer referred to her as Lady Betha.
`Will it be different since Jenny is of commoner origin?`
"No, no. That's right. Aunt Jenny has the title of princess." Rhaella says, giving him an unreadable look. "But no one refers to her as such," Doran hears her murmur.
"Now that you mention it, I only heard people refer to her as Lady Jenny, never Princess Jenny." That explains the weird look Duncan and Jenny gave him when he referred to her as `Princess` or `Your grace`. The same look Rhaella is giving him now, Doran notes. Doran also notes that Rhaella is the only Targaryen who refers to Jenny in a family way, calling her Aunt. He heard other members of the royal family address Jenny as 'Lady Jenny' or 'my firstborn's wife' or `my brohter/uncle's wife`.
After that conversation something seemed to change in Rhaella, or rather: what changed is the way she treats Doran. She no longer avoided him and wasn't distant or silent either. They spent the afternoon walking around the gardens and talking, even having a little picnic under a beautiful cherry tree in full bloom.
Doran learned that Rhaella is much smarter than her brother, just like her father she loves to read and learn new things, she learned to read at the age of four and currently her lessons are more advanced than her brother's who is older by a year. In that sense, she reminded him of Hermione, but the similarities end there. Rhaella is also a lover of the arts: she loves to sing, dance and draw. Things in which she excels at.
Doran convinced her to sing a song and was amazed at how beautiful her voice was.
"I could listen to you sing every day and I would never get tired of your voice." Doran was sincere with his words, Rhaella has a soft and melodious voice like an elf. He is sure that if Rhaella had been born in his ol world, she could have become a famous singer.
Rhaella blushed at his praise but her blush instead of cowering her seemed to light a fire inside her and she insisted that he should sing a song too.
"Is only fair don't you think, my prince?" She told him with a mischievous smile.
"I'm not a good singer, your grace." Doran tries to convince her but the princess insists and Doran has no choice but to sing a song.
The results are just as Doran expected, Rhaella was struggling to keep her smile and the knights bit their lip to keep from saying anything.
"That was interesting." Rhaella says politely and somewhat robotically.
Doran raised an eyebrow.
"You can tell it sounded like a dying animal, princess. My uncle wasn't shy about his 'praises'. " Doran remembers with a face when his mother brought him a music teacher. Singing is not his thing and he knows it. "But while the gods did not bless me with a singing voice, they endowed me with great skill with musical instruments."
"Oh?"
"My music teacher told me that he never found a harpist more talented than me." Noticing the doubtful look Doran assures her of his ability and promises to one day play the harp for her.
"I will hold you in your word prince Doran."
Unfortunately the night came and too soon for the taste of both they had to go their separate ways, to prepare for the last banquet before the Martell family leaves tomorrow. To the annoyance of both, they were seated very far from each other and could not continue with their conversation.
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