It was the year 98 after Aegon’s Conquest.
Two months had passed since that fateful night on Dragonstone.
Westeros had welcomed its newest dragonrider, Prince Daemon Targaryen, with awe and fear in equal measure.
King Jaehaerys, too, had been shocked and had expressed his concern and anger to both Baelon and Daemon alike.
All the while, Prince Maekar Targaryen remained hidden in the shadows.
Maekar stood at the edge of the open window, letting the cold wind whip across his face.
The sea was restless today, heavy and dark.
A storm was brewing near Dragonstone, bathing the ancient fortress in rain and thunder.
Since claiming his dragon, he had wondered many times whether he should reveal his feat to the world.
In the end, he had chosen not to.
At least for the moment.
Why?
A quiet scoff escaped his lips as he stared into the black sky.
Not because he feared punishment from his father or the King.
No.
Because something felt wrong.
No… something was definitely wrong.
In the last few years that feeling had only grown stronger, sinking deeper into his bones like roots.
“Aemon Targaryen,” he muttered.
“Maegelle Targaryen.”
“Viserra Targaryen.”
“Daenerys Targaryen.”
“Aegon Targaryen.”
“Gaemon Targaryen.”
“Valerion Targaryen.”
“Daella Targaryen.”
“Alyssa Targaryen.”
The last name left his mouth almost as a whisper.
He shook his head slowly.
Out of Jaehaerys and Alysanne’s thirteen children, nine were already dead.
Unbelievable.
A dark thought had taken root inside him.
He had read every story, heard every rumor about how they died.
“Gods be damned,” he muttered, but his voice sounded strange, almost hollow.
What if it wasn’t the gods?
What if it was someone else?
Someone who had only risen to power after Maegor’s reign… someone who was deliberately targeting the House of the Dragon.
“Those old men.”
Maekar’s violet eyes narrowed dangerously.
In the distance, a deep, furious roar echoed across the island.
The Cannibal had felt its rider’s anger.
For now, Maekar did not want his name written on their list of targets.
Not until he truly knew who his enemy was.
Be patient.
Be patient.
Maekar repeated the words in his head.
He had asked his father to send Ser Clement to Dragonstone, under the pretense that he wished to continue his training.
In truth, he needed a trusted ally on this island that now felt full of traitors.
His father had agreed, and Ser Clement had arrived two weeks ago by ship from King’s Landing.
Maekar placed a hand on the hilt of the sword at his belt.
It was small, yet it did its job.
“Those who dare to manipulate the dragon,” he whispered into the storm, “will soon learn what true horror feels like.”
A blinding bolt of lightning ripped across the sky.
Prince Maekar Targaryen turned away from the window, his red cloak snapping behind him.
Ser Clement stood guard before the heavy door of Prince Maekar’s chamber when it suddenly swung open from within.
He lowered his head at once.
“My Prince,” he greeted quietly.
Maekar stepped out, dressed in a dark doublet with a red silk cloak draped over his right shoulder.
The boy.
No, the young man moved with a confidence that always impressed Clement.
They walked together through the torch-lit hallways of the ancient castle, his own armor clattering with every step.
“Where is my father at the moment?” Maekar asked.
“Still in a meeting with his advisors and the lords of his territories,” Clement answered.
He had been spinning a quiet web for the prince across Dragonstone.
A few servants, paid from Maekar’s own allowance, now brought him whispers from the halls and kitchens.
He passed every word on.
It felt strange at first.
Clement had thought the prince’s constant caution was only paranoia.
He no longer believed that.
They continued deeper into the castle, descending narrow stairs until the air grew cold and heavy and the torches grew scarce.
At last they reached the Dragonmont.
A vast, black cavern stretched out before them.
“Ser Clement,” Maekar said softly, “I have never shown you or anyone what you are about to see.
Consider this my greatest sign of trust.”
Clement’s heart beat faster.
What more could this remarkable prince reveal to him?
For a long moment Maekar simply stood at the edge of the darkness, staring into the abyss.
Then the air changed.
Something massive stirred deep inside the cavern.
The wind grew heavier.
A pair of glowing green eyes appeared in the black.
Clement took a sharp breath.
“Prince…” he whispered, his voice barely there.
A terrifying dragon’s head slowly emerged from the shadows, towering above them.
Scales as dark as midnight gleamed faintly.
“This is The Cannibal,” Maekar said.
“My dragon.”
Clement had heard the old horror stories, of course.
But nothing could prepare him for the living monster now standing before him.
Powerful.
That was the word that filled his mind.
Not just the dragon… but the prince who had tamed it.
How strong must Maekar be to claim such a beast?
Without thinking, Clement dropped to one knee.
“My Prince,” he said, voice thick with awe and loyalty.
Behind Maekar, the Cannibal seemed to grow even larger, looming protectively over its rider.
Yet the prince only smiled, as if he had known exactly how this moment would go.
“Rise, Ser,” Maekar said calmly.
“I see your loyalty.”
Ser Clement rose.
“There is something I will ask you to do,” Maekar said quietly, “to confirm the suspicions I have spoken of.”
The Prince leaned in and whispered something into his ear.
The storm above Dragonstone continued for the next few days.
“So, Daemon, how is your dragon training coming along?
Are the Dragonkeepers any help?”
Maekar looked at his brother, who still gleamed with confidence, until their eyes met.
Daemon looked at him as if urging him to speak, to tell their father the truth.
“Yes, it is going very well.
Caraxes is obeying my commands far better now.
We have grown accustomed to each other.”
Baelon nodded.
“That is what I wanted to hear.”
He leaned back with a sigh.
“Viserys shall join us on Dragonstone as well. Find the original chapter at g.com.
We are one family, after all.
I have sent the raven.”
Maekar and Daemon both nodded and continued to eat.
Baelon, however, barely touched his plate.
“I watched your training today.
Your duel.”
Indeed.
They had sparred earlier, though it had not lasted long.
Daemon had overpowered him within the minute.
Yet Maekar was still proud of himself.
He had brought this body a long way already, and he would continue to do so.
Besides, Daemon was an exceptional fighter by any measure.
“Both of you did excellently.
I am sure you will follow in your brother’s footsteps and become a knight as well, Maekar.”
“I hope so,” Maekar answered.
His father seemed restless.
Distracted.
“Hm.” Baelon groaned softly.
“My appetite is not there today.
I will leave you brothers to yourselves.”
Maekar watched him leave the hall, still turning something over in his mind, when Daemon suddenly hissed across the table.
“When are you planning on telling him?
You cannot keep it a secret forever.
Though I do not even understand why you would hide it in the first place.”
Maekar sighed.
“Daemon.”
His tone was quiet.
Grave.
“Have you not wondered why so many of our family have died?
So many rising stars, riders of fearsome dragons, all gone through ordinary, perhaps unlucky events?”
Daemon narrowed his eyes, turning it over.
“You think it no coincidence?
And so you hide?”
“I hide until I have found those I can meet with the Cannibal’s flames,” Maekar said, rising slowly from his seat.
His fingers came together, nearly interlacing.
“And I am close.”
He clenched his jaw.
“So close.”
Knock.
Knock.
Both brothers turned toward the heavy wooden door, the sound barely audible beneath the rolling thunder outside.
It opened.
Ser Clement stepped through, water streaming from his armor.
“My Prince.” The tone was one Maekar did not like.
A cold feeling spread through him at once.
“You must read this.
I intercepted the raven as you asked.”
Only then did Clement notice Daemon sitting there.
Maekar did not care.
He snatched the wet parchment from his hand, its golden seal already broken, a faint smear of blood across the edge.
From the raven, most likely.
To the Archmaesters of the Citadel,
The situation on Dragonstone remains.
The old patterns continue to unfold with pleasing regularity.
The fire grows weaker by the day.
Yet there may be new fuel threatening the realm.
I request further instruction.
Maester Gerardys.
“The fire,” he whispered, his eyes widening.
“New fuel.”
He looked up.
His gaze settled on Daemon.
For a moment he simply stood there.
How could he have been so blind?
How could he not have seen it?
Stomach pain.
Now that he thought about it, his father had never mentioned it directly, but it was painfully obvious now.
His father had most likely trusted the very same man who wished him harm to heal him.
“Fuck.”
What if it was already too late?
Daemon rose instantly, the cutlery nearly clattering from the table.
“Is it as you thought, brother?”
Maekar shook his head.
“Far worse.”
He turned to Ser Clement.
“Where is the Maester right now?!”
“I came here first.
I have not seen him.”
Maekar’s gaze swept the hall.
“Ser Clement.” His voice cut low and sharp.
“Mobilise the household troops and seal the castle.
No one leaves.”
Ser Clement’s eyes lingered on Maekar for a moment, worry plain on his face, before they moved to Daemon.
He turned and left without a word.
Daemon moved to Maekar’s side, hand resting on the hilt of his sword.
Maekar said nothing.
He held out the letter.
His brother’s eyes dropped to the parchment.
Whatever he had been about to say died in his throat.
His hand tightened slowly around the paper.
“We have a rat to hunt,” Maekar said, meeting his brother’s gaze.
“And I know where it will appear.”
Maester Gerardys lifted his wooden coffer from the table.
The small glass vials clinked against one another with every step he took.
He had been called to Prince Baelon’s chambers again.
Stomach pain, the servants had said.
Of course it was stomach pain.
Before leaving, he paused at the window.
The storm had not relented.
Rain streaked the glass in long lines, and in its dark surface he could see his own reflection staring back at him.
Grey robes.
A familiar face.
The chain around his neck, each link a different metal, each metal a different mastery.
He had earned every one of them.
A smile appeared.
The Citadel had not chosen him for this work by accident.
He was not some blunt instrument.
He was precise.
Patient.
A maester served the realm, and the realm was better without dragons.
It had always been better without them.
Aegon had proven that, in his own twisted way, by showing what a single man with a dragon could do to a continent.
More riders.
More chaos.
Prince Jaehaerys grew weaker by the month.
Good King Jaehaerys, they called him.
The Conciliator.
The Old King.
He had reigned for more than half a century and in that time he had done everything the Citadel could have hoped for.
He talked, compromised, negotiated, and above all, kept the dragons leashed.
A useful king.
A manageable king.
But Prince Aemon hadn’t been his father.
Baelon as well.
Baelon was loud and proud and strong, and he had already sired two boys who looked at dragons the way other children looked at horses.
Tools.
Birthright.
That could not be allowed to continue.
A couple of years at most.
The dosage was slow by design, slow enough to look like nature taking its course.
No one would question it.
Gerardys turned from the window and opened his door.
He stepped into the hallway and stopped.
There was clattering somewhere in the castle.
At this hour it meant nothing good.
Strange.
Really strange.
He turned the corner quickly and had barely taken three steps when he heard it from somewhere behind him.
“Find the Maester!”
Gerardys pressed his hand flat against his mouth.
His mind moved fast.
His feet faster, which had already begun to carry him forward.
The coffer swung at his side.
How?
How had they known?
He had been so careful.
The ravens were coded, the language vague enough to mean nothing to anyone who did not already know what they were looking for.
It did not matter now.
So he ran.
His grey robes slapped against the stone floor, his breathing loud.
He pressed himself into a doorway as two guards crossed the far end of the corridor, their torches throwing shadows onto the walls.
He held his breath.
They moved on.
Gerardys kept moving, taking the longer route, the servant’s passage behind the kitchens, until he rounded a final corner and saw it.
Prince Baelon’s chambers.
And no guards.
He stopped.
He looked left, then right, then back at the doors.
No guards.
Something about that should have troubled him.
But he did not have the breath or the time to think properly.
He believed in the work.
He had always believed in the work.
He had understood it then and he understood it now, more completely than ever.
The Targaryens must be controlled.
The plan had been revealed.
There was no going back.
He clenched his teeth and moved toward the doors, glancing back over his shoulder every few steps.
The doors opened without a sound.
Baelon lay in his bed, still, his breathing slow and even.
The storm filled the silence in his stead.
Gerardys set the coffer down quietly and reached inside.
He pulled out a syringe.
Small, glass and iron, the kind the maesters of the Citadel had been refining for decades.
He had used it before.
Never like this, never so directly, but the principle was the same.
A precise amount.
Into the vein at the neck, where the blood ran close to the surface.
He straightened.
It would be quick.
He moved toward the bed, the thunder swallowing the sound of his steps entirely.
A flash of lightning split the sky beyond the window and for a brief moment the entire room was thrown into pale, cold light.
It illuminated Baelon’s face for a moment.
Then the light died.
Gerardys raised the syringe.
Another flash of lightning.
A small silhouette stood at the far end of the chamber, perfectly still.
For just a moment the light found its face.
Violet eyes.
Silver hair.
An expression that did not belong on a child.
Then the darkness took him again.
“Maester?”
Maekar stepped out of the shadow.
Gerardys flinched.
Then the mask returned.
“Your father called for me, my Prince.
Stomach pain.”
He held up the syringe.
“This will help him rest easier.”
“Oh?” Maekar tilted his head.
His voice was very gentle.
“Then what are you waiting for?”
Something moved behind Gerardys’s eyes.
Just for a moment.
The faintest flicker of contempt.
It really worked.
“At once, my Prince.”
He bowed and turned toward the bed.
Then came a sound from the other side of the room.
The lock had turned.
Gerardys went still.
Daemon stood at the door, the key in his hand.
He said nothing.
Slowly, Gerardys turned back around.
“Vermin.”
A flash of silver.
His head struck the floor a moment before the rest of him did.
Maekar looked down at him, sighing almost melancholically.
Blood spatters riddled his face.
“I am not a patient man after all.”
Then slowly he raised his gaze, toward the man in the bed.
Baelon’s eyes were wide open.
Pumping out chapters like there’s no tomorrow.