I raised my arms high above my silver-haired head, letting out a long, theatrical stretch that set my shoulder joints popping like dry firewood.
By the gods, that had been a thoroughly productive morning.
My muscles were screaming from hours of hacking at the wooden pell, my knuckles were bruised, and my wool tunic was soaked through with sweat, yet a deep, satisfying sense of physical accomplishment buzzed through my veins.
The fresh, crisp air blowing off the Blackwater Rush tasted remarkably sweet up here on the hill.
In my previous life, every breath of city air was laced with diesel exhaust, industrial smog, and microplastics.
Out here in seventeenth-year-after-the-Conquest King’s Landing, despite the occasional whiff of horse manure and rotting fish drifting up from the muddy harbor below, the sky was completely unpolluted and pristine.
Right now, all I wanted in the world was a steaming hot bath to scrub the mud out of my skin, followed by a quiet hour in my solar reading dusty histories before heading out again.
The morning was still remarkably young, after all.
Catching sight of a young castle servant boy shuffling down the stone hallway with a wicker basket of soiled linens, I raised a commanding finger.
“You there.
Run down to the bathhouse and inform the attendants to prepare a boiling tub for Prince Maegor.
Tell them I want lavender oil and plenty of dry towels.” The boy nearly dropped his basket in terror, his eyes going wide as saucers as he bowed so low his nose nearly scraped the flagstones.
“A-at once, my prince!
Right away!” he stammered, before turning on his heel and bolting down the corridor like a whipped cur.
I watched him go with a slight grin, resuming my leisurely stroll back toward my private bedchamber.
The intense physical exertion of the training yard had sent a wave of pure, serene clarity rushing through my mind.
It made high-level strategic thinking feel entirely effortless.
If I was being completely honest with myself, I could easily get addicted to this glorious physical high.
No wonder the original Maegor Targaryen grew up to be such an absolute, unstoppable terror on the battlefield.
When you combined supreme Valyrian dragon-riding genetics with a relentless, fanatical work ethic, the resulting human being was built to conquer worlds.
Reaching my bedchamber, I pushed open the heavy oak door, throwing a polite nod over my shoulder to my white-cloaked shadow.
“Rest your legs for a moment, Ser Humfrey.
I shall be inside a short while.” “I shall hold the door, my prince,” Ser Humphrey replied curtly, taking up his post beside the iron wall-sconce.
I stepped inside, pulled the thick door shut, and slid the heavy iron bolt into place.
Taking a deep breath of the quiet room, I pulled my sweat-stained linen tunic over my head and tossed it casually onto the chest at the foot of my bed.
Bare-chested and breathing comfortably, I dropped to my hands and knees on the cold flagstones, reaching my long arm deep into the dusty dark beneath my bed frame.
My fingers brushed against a loose stone in the masonry near the baseboards.
I pried the flagstone back, reaching into the hidden hollow cavity beneath to retrieve a thick, leather-bound journal wrapped in oiled calfskin.
Now, I was well aware that hiding a top-secret document beneath one’s bed was arguably the most cliché, amateur move in the history of espionage.
But frankly, I did not care in the slightest.
Who in this fuckass castle was going to be unemployed and suicidal enough to go crawling under the bed of Queen Visenya’s five-year-old son?
If a servant girl came in to sweep the dust, I would simply move the book to another secret crevice.
For now, it served its purpose perfectly.
Carrying the leather journal over to my oak writing desk, I opened the small wooden side drawer and pulled out a hand-held brass mirror.
I pulled a high-backed wooden chair over to the desk, sat my heavy frame down, and propped the mirror upright on the desk surface directly behind the open book.
Next, I unstoppered a small glass vial of dark gall-nut ink and retrieved a sharpened goose quill.
I let out a soft, annoyed sigh as I dipped the feather tip into the black ink.
Gods above, I genuinely needed to invent a proper graphite pencil one of these days.
Writing with a goose quill was a tedious, messy, utterly infuriating process.
Every three sentences required dipping the nib, blowing on the wet parchment to prevent smudging, and carefully scraping away stray ink splatters with a small iron blade.
The only reason I hadn’t thrown the foolish feather out the window was because it looked undeniably cool sticking out of a bronze inkwell.
If Targaryen dragons possessed feathers, I would have personally plucked a golden plume from Vhagar to make a quill.
Unfortunately for my aesthetic tastes, giant fire-breathing reptiles had scales instead.
I wondered briefly if mythical phoenixes actually existed in the far-off, unexplored jungles of Sothoryos or the shadowed mountains beyond Asshai.
Now that would make a truly magnificent quill.
Shaking the stray thoughts from my head, I cracked open the thick journal, flipping past dozens of densely written pages until I reached a fresh, blank sheet of vellum.
Adjusting the angle of the mirror so it reflected the page directly before my eyes, I lowered the quill and began to write.
Now, why exactly was I writing in front of a mirror, and why was this entire process so convoluted?
The answer was remarkably simple: absolute, paranoid security.
The mirror allowed me to write in fluid, inverted handwriting, mirror-scripting from right to left like Leonardo da Vinci back in my previous world.
But even if some clever court maester or sneaky royal spymaster managed to hold my journal up to a mirror to read the reversed letters, they would still be greeted by complete, unreadable gibberish.
That was because I was not using the Common Tongue or High Valyrian script at all.
Instead, I was writing in a completely different script from my previous life.
Being multilingual in a medieval fantasy universe was an absolute, glorious superpower.
Even if King Aegon, Queen Visenya, and the Grand Maester of the Citadel teamed up to analyze my secret journal, they would spend twenty years assuming I was scribbling dark, eldritch blood-magic runes from across the Jade Sea.
And what, precisely, was I recording inside this secret ledger?
Everything.
Every single crucial piece of scientific knowledge, engineering blueprint, agricultural crop-rotation strategy, and military tactic I could recall from my modern education.
I wrote detailed distillation procedures for clean alcohol and antiseptics, blast-furnace designs for refining high-grade steel, and basic notes on modern sanitation and medical hygiene to basically anything and everything.
Furthermore, I recorded every single future historical event, rebellion, assassination, and political betrayal from George R.R.
Martin’s books that I could remember.
If I ever suffered a severe blow to the head during battle, like the original Maegor did during his famous Trial of Seven, or if my human memory began to fade as the decades marched on, this book would serve as my ultimate, unassailable hard-drive backup.
I was halfway through scribbling a detailed structural diagram of a Roman-style water-wheel saw when three sharp, polite knocks echoed against the oak door of my chamber.
“Your bath is prepared, my prince,” the black-haired servant boy called out from the hallway.
“Understood,” I called back smoothly.
I instantly closed the leather journal, wrapped it tightly in its oiled calfskin cover, and slid it back into its secret stone hollow beneath the bedboards, fitting the flagstone back into place with a quiet click.
I pocketed the brass mirror in my drawer, wiped my ink-stained fingers on a rag, and pulled a clean linen shirt over my broad chest.
Along the way, the shoved the plumbata in one of the drawers as well.
Unbolting the door, I swung it open to find the young servant standing beside Ser Humphrey, holding his hands clasped tightly before his woolen tunic.
The boy bowed deeply, keeping his eyes glued to his worn leather boots.
“If it pleases Your Grace, I can lead you to the bathhouse chambers.” “No need, lad.
I know the way,” I said pleasantly, reaching into the pocket of my trousers and pulling out a heavy, gleaming copper star.
I tossed the coin through the air toward him.
The boy caught the copper coin with surprising reflexes, staring at the stamped metal in absolute, wide-eyed disbelief.
A copper star was more coin than his peasant family saw in a fortnight of brutal castle labor.
“T-thank you, my lord!
May the Seven Bless Your Grace!” he squeaked, bowing three times in rapid succession before practically dancing down the corridor in joy.
Now, this was precisely the point where other reborn, modern protagonists in web novels loved to whine and complain about the horrors of feudal nobility, grumbling about how uncomfortable it felt to have servants bowing to them or offering them basic deference.
Not me, though.
Never not me.
This royal life was hands-down the absolute best existence imaginable, and I had zero intention of ever giving it up.
The raw, unchecked political power I held over common men was not something I gloated over, but I deeply appreciated the absolute respect and deference afforded to my bloodline.
If I was being entirely honest with myself, I vastly preferred ruling through genuine respect rather than mindless terror.
Men who obeyed you out of sheer fear would eventually slip a drop of nightshade into your wine glass the second your back was turned out of desperate self-preservation.
But men who respected your strength, rewarded your generosity, and believed in your leadership would gladly march into the mouth of a dragon for you.
“Shall we, Ser Humfrey?” I asked, stepping out into the corridor and gesturing toward the main staircase.
“Lead on, Prince Maegor,” the Kingsguard knight replied, falling into his customary position three paces behind my left shoulder, his white wool cloak rustling against his greaves.
We climbed the wide spiral staircase of the Aegonfort, stepping past drafty stone archways where the morning sun streamed through, casting long shadows across the floorboards.
Servants hauling oak buckets, guardsmen holding steel spears, and highborn squires carrying velvet doublets all halted in their tracks as I walked past, flattening themselves against the stone walls and bowing their heads in deep respect.
I was merely a five-year-old child, yes, but I was a Targaryen prince who stood nearly as tall as an eight-year-old boy, with broad shoulders and the icy purple eyes of a conqueror.
As we navigated the quiet upper corridors, I decided to break the silence.
“Ser Humfrey, tell me truly: do you never grow utterly weary of trailing three paces behind my backside and staring blankly at cold stone walls for twelve hours a day?” The Kingsguard knight did not break his cadence, his iron-shod boots striking the flagstones in a steady, rhythmic pattern.
“It is my sworn duty, my prince,” he replied in his smooth, dry voice.
“The stone walls do not plot treason against the royal blood, nor do they run away when I look at them.
It is a remarkably peaceful post compared to fighting Dornish spearmen in the red mountains.” I let out a laugh.
“A fair point, ser!
Staring at stone walls is indeed a very useful hobby.
I would certainly know a lot about it.” Ser Humfrey let out a confused chuckle, not exactly sure what I was talking about but decided not to comment on it as we arrived at the tall, bronze-studded doors of the royal bathhouse.
I pushed the heavy doors open and stepped inside, taking a long, deep breath of the thick, warm steam that filled the room.
The royal bathhouse was an absolute, glorious masterpiece of stone and marble architecture.
If there was one single luxury my father Aegon had refused to skimp on when constructing the Aegonfort, it was the royal baths.
The entire chamber was lined with dark grey river stone and polished white marble brought by ship from the Vale of Arryn.
The high vaulted ceiling featured carved stone vents that allowed the dark grey smoke to escape while trapping the soothing heat within.
In the center of the room sat a massive, sunken circular tub carved from a single block of black granite, fed by a network of heavy copper pipes that ran directly from giant water cauldrons heated by wood fires in the vaults below.
Now, there were many aspects of this medieval fantasy world that I could complain about endlessly.
The plumbing…
We do not talk about the plumbing.
The lack of modern dentistry, the absence of refrigeration, and the primitive state of medicine were all thoroughly depressing.
But there was one simple, magnificent reality that made all those medieval hardships completely bearable: being a highborn royal prince.
The absolute opulence, luxury, and comfort I enjoyed up here in the royal quarters were unmatched by anything else in the continent.
Four young, attractive female bath attendants, clad in simple linen gowns with their sleeves rolled up to their elbows, immediately stepped forward from the shadows, bowing low before me.
I had specifically instructed the master of the household moons ago that only female attendants were to be assigned to my personal baths.
I had zero interest in having hairy, burly medieval men scrubbing my skin with stiff brushes, thank you very much.
“Welcome, Your Grace,” the head bathmaid whispered softly.
“The water is hot and scented with crushed lavender and almond oil.” With practiced, quiet efficiency, the handmaidens stepped forward and untied the laces of my linen shirt, slipping the garment off my shoulders before unbuckling my leather belt and shoes.
Standing naked on the warm marble floor, I stepped down the short stone stairs into the steaming black granite tub.
The moment my feet touched the water, I let out a loud, pathetic groan of absolute bliss.
The water was piping hot, bubbling softly from the copper feed-pipes, and heavily infused with the sweet, soothing fragrance of fresh lavender buds and sweet almond oil floating on the surface.
I sank deep into the tub until the steaming water reached my chin, resting my sore back against the smooth, curved granite wall.
Every single ache, knot, and spasm in my overworked shoulder muscles instantly began to melt away under the glorious heat.
The handmaidens gathered around the edges of the granite tub, setting to work with gentle precision.
One girl held a carved wooden cup, scooping up warm water and pouring it gently over my silver-gold hair, while another applied a thick, sweet-smelling soap lather milled from olive oil, goat’s milk, and crushed rosemary leaves.
Her long, slender fingers massaged my scalp with gentle, rhythmic pressure, working out the tension in my neck until my eyes rolled back in my head.
A third maid used a soft sea sponge to gently scrub the dark mud, sweat, and dried dirt off my chest, arms, forearms, and legs, while the fourth girl massaged my aching calf muscles beneath the bubbling water.
Floating in the fragrant, boiling water while four attentive handmaidens massaged my sore muscles was an experience so deeply, obscenely comfortable that I came dangerously close to falling fast asleep right then and there.
My eyelids grew heavy, my breathing slowed to a deep, peaceful rhythm, and my brain finally drifted into a state of total, blissful rest.
Alas, all good things had to come to an end.
After nearly an hour of pure relaxation, the water began to lose its intense heat, and I snapped myself out of my peaceful trance.
I raised my heavy arms, signaling to the maids that I was finished.
The attendants immediately rushed forward with thick, warm wool towels, wrapping them around my shoulders and waist as I stepped up out of the stone tub.
They led me over to a padded wooden bench near the hearth fire, drying my skin and combing the damp silver locks of my hair until it glistened like polished dragon-glass in the firelight.
Now, I wasn’t able to use the servants to their full advantage, but when I grow older…
Once I was dry, two servants produced a brand-new, elaborate outfit that my mother Queen Visenya had personally selected for me earlier that morning.
I let out a slight, quiet scowl as I looked at the garments.
It was a formal, highborn riding ensemble made of the finest, most expensive materials in the Seven Kingdoms.
There was a doublet of rich, midnight-black velvet embroidered with crimson dragon scales along the lapels, paired with a tunic of dark Valyrian red silk that fell to my knees.
The trousers were cut from soft, black lamb’s wool, tucked into sleek leather riding boots dyed charcoal black and polished to a mirror shine.
A wide belt made of linked bronze dragon-heads was buckled tightly around my waist.
I stood patiently as the handmaidens buttoned the velvet doublet and smoothed out the silk sleeves.
While I personally preferred the loose, comfortable simplicity of a plain linen tunic and leather trousers for daily training, I had to admit that this new outfit looked incredible.
Drippy as hell.
My mother Visenya clearly understood the immense psychological value of personal presentation.
She wanted everyone in the city to look at her broad, broad-shouldered son and see a prince of blood and fire.
Letting out a long, thoroughly refreshed sigh, I checked my reflection in the tall bronze mirror on the wall, adjusting the silver collar of my silk tunic.
I turned on my heel, pushed open the bronze-studded doors of the bathhouse, and stepped out into the stone corridor, where Ser Humfrey was standing post, staring blankly at the wall masonry across the hall.
“Ser Humfrey!” I shouted cheerfully, snapping my leather gloves onto my broad hands with a sharp, loud crack.
The Kingsguard knight turned his helm toward me, his brown eyes widening slightly as he took in my elaborate black-and-red velvet attire.
I flashed him a wide grin, resting my hand on my hip, “I desire to venture out into the city!”