Word of Aegon Targaryen's proclamations swept across the Narrow Sea like a storm tide, striking the Stepstones first, then rolling toward Tyrosh, Myr, Lys, and the western shores of the Seven Kingdoms. Men spoke of nothing else in taverns, counting-houses, and council chambers.
The first decree was simple and thunderous.
Prince Aegon Targaryen claimed sovereignty over the Stepstones.
Pirates lurking in the shoals were given one choice, flee at once, or present themselves on Bloodstone Isle, now renamed Drakoncrest in Aegon's honor, to register for amnesty and swear loyalty. Merchants were ordered to keep to the main channel and pay a toll equal to a tenth of their cargo's worth. Any ship attempting to skulk through hidden inlets would be seized as smugglers.
The second decree struck even harder.
Aegon, Lord of the Stepstones, declared that the island-city of Tyrosh, "an ancient holding of Westeros", might remain where it stood so long as its people disarmed, accepted a royal garrison, withdrew at once from the Triarchy, and became the "Autonomous Region of Tyrosh" under his protection.
If they refused, he would make war on them.
The Narrow Sea roiled with disbelief. Tyroshi magisters sputtered with fury. The great lords of Westeros called him mad. Yet even as they mocked him, twenty warships were already bearing away from the docks beneath the shadow of Drakoncrest's dark cliffs, sails snapping in the wind.
Aegon stood upon the quay, the sea breeze dragging at his hair. Above him, three dragons circled the departing fleet, three shadows against the bright sky, wings dipping and curling like banners of fire and blood.
His expression, however, was tired rather than triumphant.
"If only the cargo ships could have stayed as well," he murmured.
Those were already sailing back toward the Stepstones. He needed them, desperately so. Warships alone could not build a realm. Supplies would. Wood, iron, stone, grain, wool, leather, and the hands to shape them into something fit for a prince's ambition.
Behind him, the newly laid foundations of his port gleamed pale in the sunlight. Lines had been marked for cranes and harbors, for storehouses and, most importantly, a shipyard.
Aegon ran a gloved hand along the railing of the pier, his mind racing.
He had the coin. He had shipwrights, craftsmen from Driftmark, Storm's End, and even a few daring men from Braavos who cared more for silver than for politics. But ships demanded more than builders. They demanded an industry, a world of laborers and raw materials feeding into a single heartbeat.
Ironworks for nails and anchors. Timber mills for planks and ribs. Stone quarries for drydocks. Saltworks for preserving food. Soap for keeping a growing port clean and free of sickness.
All of it needed land, workers, and, above all... speed.
Aegon exhaled, tapping his chin with thought. "Extraordinary times require extraordinary measures."
For centuries, Tyrosh had fattened itself upon the labor of slaves. Hundreds of thousands lived there; hundreds of thousands more in the Disputed Lands it ruled. Nearly two-thirds were bound in chains.
Aegon's demands upon Tyrosh were meant to be impossible. Even had the magisters bent their proud necks, he would have found another pretext for war. For Myr he intended to grant to Aemond. Lys, perhaps, to young Daeron one day. But Tyrosh, the city and the lands behind it, would be his.
He would shatter Tyrosh until nothing remained but ash and laborers who would help him build the Stepstones into something new. Something powerful.
And he would do it without technically breaking the Seven Kingdoms' ban on slave trading. Tyrosh's chained hordes would become "captives" and "citizens through service." The Free Cities could hardly unite against him on behalf of a city that had abandoned them. And across Essos, the Rebel Armies, those wild zealots crying for the end of bondage, would be too busy fighting slavers in the east to interfere with his designs in the west.
Three years to strengthen the Stepstones, he thought. Five more to swallow the Disputed Lands whole.
And then, when Viserys breathed his last and civil war erupted…
Aegon could finally strike as he pleased. With numbers. With wealth. And with fire.
He could break the Blacks. Break the great houses of Westeros. Rebuild the realm in his own image.
Aboard the Narrow Sea
Far from the harbor's calm, chaos ruled.
Five lean warships cut across the waves in pursuit of a lumbering cargo vessel. Grappling hooks clattered against her high sides, biting deep. Men climbed like spiders, their boots slipping against wet wood.
Hugh was the first to crest the rail.
He wore full plate, heavy, blackened, unadorned, and yet he mounted the ship with the ease of a man stepping onto a threshold. Arrows met him as soon as his helm cleared the edge. He lifted his greatsword, the steel ringing as shafts splintered against it, others sliding harmlessly off the plates covering his chest and throat.
One of the bowmen balked, his jaw falling open. "Gods… how does he climb in that armor?"
But Hugh neither slowed nor answered. He surged forward, swinging the greatsword one-handed. The blade was five fingers wide, its edge thick and hungry. In his grip it moved like a living thing, like a small dragon with steel for scales.
Two bowmen died before they could scream, hacked apart in a spray of crimson.
The mercenaries faltered. Hugh's own men, long accustomed to the sight of him cleaving foes like firewood, used their hesitation like a door flung open. They surged across the deck, shouting as steel met steel.
From the far end of the ship, a voice rang out:
"Kill these pirates! A Meereen gold coin for every head!"
An old man strode forward, richly robed, hair silvered with age, and yet a slave's collar clung to his throat like a brand. His offer stiffened the mercenaries' spines. Gold could quiet fear, even fear of the armored monster tearing through their ranks.
Hugh cut another man down, snorting softly at the reward. Honor, he thought, not coin.
"For honor!" he bellowed, and his men took up the cry, ramming the syllables like war-drums into the air.
The old slave, Alton by name, paled. He sensed at once that something was wrong, terribly wrong.
"Warrior!" he shouted over the din. "My master is Vittario Daznak, the greatest of Meereen! If there is misunderstanding here, we are willing to pay-"
Hugh turned toward him slowly.
Blood streaked the visor of his helm. Behind it, his eyes, cold, purple, and pitiless, fixed upon the trembling man.
Alton swallowed. He had talked himself out of trouble a hundred times before. A bag of coin here. A favor owed there. His master entrusted him with rich "business trips," and Alton always lingered for pleasures along the way. What harm? There were mercenaries aboard, and money solved all things.
Or so he had believed.
Hugh stooped, seized a fallen spear, and hurled it with effortless fury.
The weapon struck Alton in the chest and carried him backward until the shaft buried itself in a timber post, leaving him pinned like an insect to a board. His legs kicked twice, then stilled.
He died staring at Hugh, at the carnage he could no longer buy his way out of.
Hugh spared him no more thought. Wealth meant nothing. Power meant little. Only victory. Only honor.
His sword rose again.
But then, A sound split the sky.
A dragon's roar, sharp with panic.
Another followed, deeper, mocking, and predatory.
Hugh froze mid-swing. He lifted his helmeted head, scanning the sky.
Two shadows circled above the ship. One dragon was brown as old hide, wings beating in frantic bursts. The other was greater, midnight black, vast as a moving mountain, jaws flashing ivory when it snapped.
"Why is the Cannibal," Hugh breathed. "Chasing Sheepstealer?"
Even as he spoke, the Cannibal surged forward with terrifying speed. Its jaws clamped around Sheepstealer's tail, and the two dragons collided in a violent knot of wings and fury, spiraling across the sky as the sea erupted beneath them.
The battle on deck faltered. Men, pirates, mercenaries, slaves, stared upward with as much fear as awe.
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A/N: Aegon's ambition has begun to stir.As his power grows, so do his foes, traitors, and enemies rising with blades already drawn.
Will he truly succeed… or be crushed before he can claim it all?
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