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13.07% GOT/ASOIAF: Son of the Unworthy / Chapter 14: 14

章節 14: 14

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186 AC

Kingslanding

Aerion Targaryen

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"Lord Stark what an uncommon sight, haven't you ever heard Starks don't do well south of the neck?" Brandon Stark the Warden of the North turns to face me with an 'annoyed' look on his face.

"Prince Aerion, what a pleasure." His dry response brings a smile to my face but the people around us look back and forth between us with worried looks.

Brandon has hosted me and Danny a few times when we have flown to the North for a whole multitude of reasons. The first visits had the Stark man on edge and honestly a bit nervous but he hid it better than most. Recent visits have grown a good relationship between us as we plan to help the North in a big way.

I frequently fly to talk with different Lords instead of sending ravens when it involves a lot of gold. My plans and talks with Brandon have gone well and I then was able to talk to the Lord Commander of the Night's watch. My older brother the king easily gave his blessing on the idea I had and so with all three of those approvals, the plan was green-lit.

Settling the gift, the whole gift from the wall to the end of the good queen Alysanne's 'new gift'. there are many abandoned and wasted-away keeps and towers scattered throughout but I have a long-term plan. The gift will be settled by Northern houses using their second sons who don't stand to inherit anything.

An old decrepit castle on the east coast will be used as the Targaryen castle in the gift, temporarily at least. The Lordships that come with these castles and lands are in a political grey area as it is owned by the Night's watch as a neutral entity. The Nights watch owns it and is allowing us to settle it but even if they didn't like the idea they can't really stop us anyway. So the Lordships come with a bunch of red tape and are easily stripped if anything happens the Nights watch don't like.

The Nights watch can't enforce anything they say or want so that is where I come in, House Targaryen will handle the peace between the new Lords and the Night's watch. If anyone is not paying what they agreed to pay to the Nights watch I will be coming to collect in person, or my people will. That was the deal to get the Nights watch in and the 'tax' is a bitter pill to swallow if I am honest at twenty-five percent of earnings.

The Nights Watch is getting ten of that into their pockets and I am getting ten percent as well into my own pockets. It is set up that in the future when I die the ten percent will go to my line of Targaryen specifically. The king wanted five percent for the crown which is fair seeing how we are only using his name and crown to facilitate this deal. So the new Lords who are made up of unused sons and even some bastards from Houses of the North will be getting seventy-five percent of their earnings and doing all the work.

In the short term, I will be having men I have under me keep the peace and deal with large parties of wildlings. House Targaryen is responsible for keeping the peace or in other words killing wildling raiders but it is a simple matter. Most of the Lords will be wanting to defend the lands themselves anyway to 'prove themselves'. In the future House Targaryen will only have to get involved in major conflicts like civil wars and massive raids by wildlings. Long term it will be free gold other than burning some Wildlings that jump the wall now and then.

The 'seat' on the east coast is unnamed as of now and will begin reconstruction soon and will be given to my second-born child in the future unless they don't want it. It is not the best seat so I am not wanting a kid of mine to take it but the end game is to give the seat to someone loyal when we upgrade. Skagos is the real end game in the North with it potentially having multiple volcanos and making for an actual powerful seat for the House of the Dragon. A castle built on Skagos using the profits made from the gift is what I want for my secondborn, and it doesn't look too hard to achieve.

Feeling an arm wrap around my waist I snap out of autopilot while talking with Brandon and turn to see Danny smiling at Lord Stark.

"Hello Lord Stark, it is nice that you are here." He smiles and nods back as I slip an arm around Daenerys.

"It is nice to see you again Princess Daenerys." Danny looks up at me with a tilt of her head after nodding to Brandon.

"What were you two troublemakers talking about?" I snort as Brandon chuckles, I grab a cup from a serving girl as she walks by and bring it to my lips to wet my throat.

"We were just talking about who and when people will be moving into the different keeps around the gift. The sooner they start the sooner we will be making profits and Lord Stark is excited to get the North more independent as far as food goes." She hums and nods along as her eyes squint a bit.

"How have people been taking it? Last we heard they were outraged at the 'tax' and refused to participate." Danny asks Brandon with an amused voice.

"One stepped up and then they all started jumping in realizing their 'defiance' did not lower the tax and only stood to lose them the profits they could make. The idea it is people who would not inherit lands anyway have most just happy to be doing something. A few problems still came up but I handled them and some Lords sent their own men to help their kids cut out a path. I expect it to be a few years at the very least before anything will be harvested beyond what they will use themselves." Danny taps my side and I know she is wanting to talk alone.

"I am glad to hear it, I look forward to talking later with you again with my brother present. Remember what I said about paving roads with Dragon fire if they can dig a trench and fill it with stone. I have tested it and it may not equal the glory of the dragon roads in Essos but it is simple to make, check the road out yourself if you want it is near the Mammoth pens." He looks thoughtful and nods once more.

"That will help speed up travel through the gift but it could also be useful in the actual North as well to speed up travel." I hear music start up and use a dance with my engaged as an excuse to break off conversations there.

We walk away from the more crowded areas and get somewhere a bit quieter where I set my hands on her hips and she places hers on my shoulders.

"So you wanted to talk?" She nods and looks around before pressing herself closer.

" A woman is attending the celebrations from Pentos and I managed to get from her that A Khalasar has been causing problems for a few years now. A Khal by the name of Merio with a Khalasar of thirty thousand has been taking offerings and still raiding afterward without fail. No one has been able to pay enough tribute to stave off an attack." I purse my lips in thought and try to remember what I can about Pentos.

"They can't hold slaves after they lost the war to Braavos so they cant buy Unsullied, which leaves them to hire sell swords for their defense. It seems the Prince would just rather pay for them to all be burned and avoid any potential failure of Sell swords." She gives a 'so so' gesture and I raise a brow.

"He is scared of being a sacrifice, when a Prince of Pentos fails to defend the city he is offered as a sacrifice and then replaced. It is like being the scapegoat for everyone to blame, you have a little more power than everyone but it comes at a steep cost." I shake my head in amusement.

"His life hangs in the balance and he only offered a million gold dragons?" She snorts with a smile spreading across her face.

"I have found a ship that is already heading to Pentos at first light and we can send a counteroffer to the Prince. I was thinking if I am correct we can sheer him for much more than half a million." God, I feel a warm feeling inside when she schemes for massive gains like this, it gets me very hot.

"God I love you." She rolls her eyes but her pale cheeks grow a bit pink.

"I am glad but could you not look at me like that when there are people around?" She sighs exaggeratedly but I only close the rest of the distance between us and hold her against me.

"Why are you embarrassed or something? There is no reason to be, we will wed after the tourney and there will be lots of people there I am sure. Lots of crying women and men who feel like they missed out on their big break." I am looking forward to being married for a whole number of reasons but I would be lying if I said one wasn't to curb the marriage requests.

I mean I have letters from pretty much every House in Westeros and even some people beyond the Narrow Sea in Essos. Daenerys is much the same and I have caught her burning entire fireplaces full of letters from various houses.

"Whatever, let's just enjoy the dance for a bit longer and retire to write up our counteroffer to the Prince." She speaks dismissively but the smile she is wearing could brighten up a room.

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Relaxing in my room I reread the letter we will send off tomorrow and ready my stamp with some wax. Pressing the wax onto it I seal the letter and set it to the side as I blow out the little flame melting the wax and set down my stamp. My signet ring needed to be resized so I am currently stuck with a default stamp that has been used by many Targaryens. My favorite Targaryen who apparently used it was Jaehaerys the first.

"Think he will accept?" Danny asks with a yawn and I shrug.

"If he can afford it, the faceless men charge apparently a kingdom's worth of gold to do hits so I expect the same to torch an army. It is a shame I can't just torch the men, the horses would be very useful to ship over here." She purses her lips and rocks her head back and forth.

"We could maybe make something work, it will involve some scheming that could affect our public image but if you want tens of thousands of horses it could be worth it." I sit back in my seat and look into her enchanting eyes.

She is the one with the experience of traveling with the Dothraki so her idea might be worth trying.

"What do you have in mind?" She bites her lip and hesitates.

"The only time you will see the Dothraki separate from their horses for a long period of time is when they go to Vaes Dothrak or a celebration of some kind. They even sleep next to their horses so you can't just attack at night and expect to find a field of horses to claim. We could try to have a wedding hosted with a bride offered to the Khal and then burn everyone at the wedding when there away from their horses." My eyes widen and I already foresee people using this to smear our name even if it is against horse savages.

Killing an army of horse savages is one thing when we are being paid to 'protect' a city. Scheming to kill them at a wedding is going a step beyond and leaning on breaking a perceived 'guest rights'. They don't actually have guest rights but that won't stop the rumor mill from tainting our name and trying to drag us through the mud.

"Probably not a good idea, we can just try our best to not kill every horse even if that sounds impossible." She nods and I stand up from my chair and walk around to guide her back to her room now that business is over.

When I notice she didn't stand up behind me I turn around finding her eyes upon me.

"You ok?" She nods and grabs her cup taking a sip of some arbor gold.

"I am fine, I was planning to stay a bit longer if you didn't mind." I look around the room awkwardly taking more notice of the small messes of tossed-aside clothes and crumbled notes.

"Sure we can hang out, want to play some cards?" She nods and follows me to the couch and I move Dark Sister from the cushion onto the rack above the fireplace.

I watch her face from the side of my eye as I shuffle the deck and realize this is a pretty good chance to try something. She also seems to be wanting me to try something with how she stuck around. We have made some good 'progress' with our advances and gone pretty far but never 'sealed the deal'.

I wonder if now is a good time?


創作者的想法
Pretending_Author Pretending_Author

Thank you for reading!!!

next chapter

章節 15: 15

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186 AC

Kingslanding

Tybolt Lannister

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"What have you heard?" I ask one of my knights who I tasked to approach the people around the dragon prince.

"Nothing my Lord, no one talks about him other than what is widely known. The only thing I could get from anyone is that they are expecting Balerion Otherys to arrive back from his travels to the Summer Isles. They say he will be participating in the Name day tourney and trying to win it to prove his moniker as the 'Black dread come again'." So nothing important, this prince is becoming more and more of a problem.

Dragons alone coming back is a problem but with this prince moving things around under the cover of the king I am getting worried. I have heard reports that the silver dragon has been sighted flying from one side of Westeros to the other. A long trip to the North was recent and with him talking to Lord Stark I can see something brewing.

Maybe he is trying to get a marriage alliance with a future child of his?

If he wanted the throne no one could stop him and his sister and their fire-breathing dragons. I just can't figure out what is driving this seemingly frantic action to acquire gold. Businesses and goods of all kinds and even selling himself personally to play his admittedly good music at events. His price could even make a Lannister double take but when he played in Lannisport I had to admit it was worth the cost.

This prince is a mystery and that is a problem.

If he is in need of gold so badly I wonder if he will take my son Damon as a squire, it would do my boy good to befriend the dragon rider. I am already sending Damon and some other Lannister boys to participate in his 'training camp'. Another play to make gold from what I can see from the prices of the luxury lodging but I paid it easily enough.

The game the boys play will be demonstrated for the first time Infront of such a large crowd, soccer as they call it. It will have a tournament that will reward the winner with an 'iron throne cup' filled with gold for the team to split.

I can foresee some scheme to milk out every bit of that gold back from the Lords and Ladies watching the match.

If I weren't so off-put by the sneaky prince I would attempt to befriend him myself, but he gives me a bad feeling. It is best to watch a while longer and see how the playing field looks when someone else makes a move.

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186 AC

Kingslanding

Daeron II Targaryen

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"I know it is pointless to worry but I can't help but worry when I see your brother talking with a Lord paramount." I follow her eyes and spot Aerion talking with Lord Stark who I was surprised to see arrive for my son's Name day.

They are likely talking about the gift deal, nothing to worry about.

"It is fine, worry more about the people eyeing the Dornish Ladies you invited with fire in their eyes." Reach and Stormlands Lords glaring daggers into the Dornish woman and they still laugh and carry on with no sense of surroundings.

I know they are ready to defend themselves in the unlikely scenario someone does something but I still can't help but worry about their carefree personality.

"Well Jena Dondarrion is seemingly hitting it off with our son, that is some good news at least." I smile watching my boy talk with the beautiful young lady and when he catches me looking he nods.

I shake my head with a smile before looking back across the room and catch Danny dragging away my brother.

"I didn't foresee my brother becoming so passionate about acquiring Harrenhal, if I am honest it would not be a problem to give it to him at this point. I would get some complaints from a few Lords but they would easily be quieted. Mainly the Tullys who will take offense to Harrenhal swearing directly to the Iron throne. But no one can say he is not worth Harrenhal, I mean just the dragons make him worth the seat. His recent actions that have been making massive waves and earning him a lot of gold show he is capable." I feel my wife pull my hand to her lips and kiss it.

"It is good that you will have such a powerful and loyal person who is family sitting in the biggest castle in Westeros. If he follows through and restores it and completes the other plans he has talked about he will be one of the strongest 'Lords' in Westeros. That is not even counting his dragon and his soon-to-be wife's dragon as well." I smile and pull her hand to my lips and kiss it but notice a thoughtful look on her face.

"What's wrong?" She shakes her head and smiles and I press my lips on her hand before lowing our held hands back down.

"I was just wondering again how that will work, will they be taking their own sigil and keeping the name Targaryen? They are starting their own branch at this point and I was just wondering what they planned to do with their sigil or if they are keeping it as is." I nod and look back over and catch the two dancing as the music plays and I can't stop myself from smiling.

"Let's dance as well, I love this song." I stand up and my beautiful wife follows after me as people clear out of the way.

Hopefully, I won't embarrass myself after not dancing for a few months.

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186 AC

Kingslanding

Mya Rivers

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"There they go." I dryly comment as I watch Aerion and Danny leave through a side door.

"What do you think they are up to this time?" Gwenys asks as she sips on her own cup of wine leaning against the wall.

We both tucked away onto the side of the celebration, trying to escape the hungry vultures. Too many second sons thinking they will make their father proud grabbing up a dragon blood wife who is in the line of succession. The legitimization from our father did nothing good for any of us, we didn't get bigger allowances or special privileges. The only thing we got was more people annoying us for our hand in marriage.

Thanks, dad.

"Gold, whatever it is they went to do involves gold." Gwenys chuckles as she looks away from the side door and over to Narha.

"What are you so quiet for, shouldn't you be excited your brother will be here tomorrow? It has been more than two years since he left and he is finally returning." Narha shrugs without looking interested in the slightest.

"He won't be staying long, he wants to sail to Sothoryos next and I won't see him for years once more or he will even die. I try not to think about it but I am already disappointed once more that he will just up and leave and not even give it a second thought. He enjoys traveling and seeing the world too much." Balerion and his obsession with books grew into an obsession with seeing everything for himself with his own eyes.

It is respectable that he is setting off to do what he dreams and makes me think about what I want to do. I am a woman grown now and I need to decide before it is too late, I could always try something else if I fail early.

Balerion borrowed some gold from Aerion and is paying him back by writing books about everything he finds and collecting different kinds of plants for Aerion to try and milk for gold. One half-brother is obsessed with travel and another is obsessed with making gold so he can 'buy' the biggest castle in Westeros. My full brother is also obsessed with something but it seems a lost cause if I am brutally honest.

I turn to my right and see Shiera trying her best to ignore the two bickering voices beside her.

My brother Brynden and my half-brother Aegor, both being attracted to Shiera and tried to get her attention. The girl is a bit too young to fully pursue and has not even flowered as of yet, but with how much they annoy her their chances are low. They seem to not even notice she is not willing to bother with either of them and is busy looking at a certain side door.

"Poor Brynden." I mutter and shake my head while rubbing my forehead.

"Yea he is struck with Shiera and the rivalry with Aegor only seeks to make it feel more intense, he won't back down easily. It is more of a man's pride thing at this point than real interest in Shiera as she just ignores them." My point exactly, I wonder if they are only pretending to care about her so they can keep arguing with each other at every event they meet.

"Think they will fight in the tourney?" I ask and hear a chuckle.

"I would bet on it, they will charge past anyone in the way to get at each other." I shake my head and walk toward the argument to break it up so Shiera won't suffer any longer.

"Can you two stop, you are bothering Shiera." I speak with a bit more fire than I intended and they both look over in anger before looking at Shiera.

Seeing her stare off longingly they both go stiff before looking at each other one more time.

"This is not over albino freak." Aegor grunts and walks off to harass someone else, that or rub up on his favorite brother Daemon.

"Go on, I want to talk to Shiera alone." I shoo my bother off with a hand and he scrunches up his nose before giving in and walking off with a defeated sigh.

I slip into a seat beside Shiera and wave my hand Infront of her mismatched eyes and she blinks quickly in response.

"Huh?" I snort to stop myself from laughing, she tuned out the whole world just now because of those idiots.

"What are you thinking about?" I ask knowing full well what she was thinking about, or rather who.

"I was thinking it sucks to be too young." I raise a brow and she looks over and finally makes eye contact.

Her blue eye matches the sapphires on her necklace and her green eye matches the emeralds making it look dazzling. A final gift from our father, she took the name Seastar soon after fathers passing and every time I meet these eyes I see why. It was also what her mom had said shortly before passing away after birthing her so that also factors in.

"What are you too young for, or rather who are you too young for?" I ask with a smile and she rolls her eyes and looks back to the door.

"I heard them talking about getting married soon, he will win the tourney and crown her his queen of love and beauty and then announce their hasty wedding. After that, it will be impossible to marry him myself, at least without freaking the faith out. I could slip him a love potion and convince him to fly us over the narrow sea on Moonfyre and marry me in Pentos or something." I try to catch myself but she keeps throwing verbal jabs as I stagger to reply.

"You heard them talking about getting married?" She nods slowly with her lips pursed.

"Yea, sept of Baelor and everything." Danny didn't even tell me.

Probably because it was a recent decision and she didn't think to spread the news yet, I will ask her about it. I can't help but also feel a bit defeated, I knew they were going to get married but I also hoped deep inside I would marry Aerion and take the real Targaryen name. My kids would have dragons and I would be happy with Aerion making good food every now and then and singing to me. No other man can even cook half as well as him and as far as his voice it's one of a kind, he is also fun to be around. He is nothing like the annoying men hunting me down to talk my ear off about stuff I don't care about.

"Damn this does suck." I slump back in my seat and Shiera nods with empathy in her eyes.

"It does." I snort and she raises a silver brow.

"So what's this about a love potion?" Her lips twitch up into a smile as she tries to restrain herself.


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