Mouth of the Bite, 112 AC
Laenor spun his trident once before slamming its butt down on the deck, his silver hair plastered to his face by salt and storm. His gaze never wavered from the roiling heavens, daring the god above to strike. Yet a question gnawed at him with every breath: how could he fight gods when they left no flesh to cut, no form to wound? No body or an avatar for him to injure and defeat it.
Against the Lady of the Waves, he had triumphed — but only because she was not the Lady of the ocean itself, only waves, which is a domain inferior to what he controls. He had wrestled her will from the waves and bent them to his own command. That victory had been possible. But how was he supposed to battle the Sky Lord, whose will was carried in every gust of wind, every strike of lightning, every storm cloud above?
Thunder answered him. Lightning speared down, striking perilously close to the ships. Winds tore at the sails, so sharp they seemed like blades. Only Laenor's swift intervention kept the fleet from being split apart or torched by fire from the heavens.
Not wanting to just stand there and think Laenor decided to act. He chose his first battlefield: the rain. He forced his will against the torrents, uncertain whether he faced the Lord of the Skies or the Sacred Storms, but refusing to yield regardless. Laenor gritted his teeth, dragging the deluge under his control. He shaped it, molded it, until vast fans of water rose above the ships, their sweeping arcs like the wings of sea-dragons. With a thought, the fans spun, and winds of his own making blew upward, driving back the dark clouds above.
But his mastery was not in the winds. He could control them only roughly, and the Lord of the Skies pounced on that weakness. A counter-gale screamed down from on high, slamming into Laenor's makeshift fans. Water sprayed in sheets as the two forces of air collided, ripping the very sky apart.
"I swear to the sea!" Laenor roared over the storm. "Have you no shame? No honor? Three against one? Do you fear me so much?"
His voice was swallowed by thunder. The heavens answered with cruelty. At all four corners of his fleet, new storms twisted into being. Hurricanes, vast and merciless, their walls of cloud and wind closing in like a noose.
Laenor's pride flared, but it did not blind him. He knew when defeat was inevitable, and though he might throw his life away, he would not squander the lives of his men. Retreat was not an option anymore. If he intends to live and save the lives of his men in doing so, he has to retreat. With that thought, Laenor decided on his next course of action.
His water-fans folded inward, reshaping into vast shields that braced against the razor wind. His focus dove into the sea, and there his command was absolute. The waves that had begun to stir again he slammed flat with his will, forcing them still. Lady of the Waves was as much a threat to him as a small fish to a leviathan. Water was his dominion. His to command.
He turned the ships east, guiding them toward what narrow hope remained — the passage toward the Narrow Sea, perhaps landfall on the coast of the North or at Widow's Watch. Yet his heart sank. Two storms, furious and chaotic, barred the way. Lightning fell like spears, rain hammered down on the empty wooden deck, and the winds shredded canvas like parchment. Laenor tried to bend the storm-winds, but their chaos slipped through his fingers. The storm was alive, its will far greater than his own command of air.
But water — always water — answered him. He caught the surging rain, the rushing waves, the rivulets streaming across the decks. With them he shaped barriers, domes of fluid force that caught the lightning and dispersed it into harmless steam. Shields of water, fragile yet divine, wrapped his ships in desperate protection.
And then he felt it.
A presence. Vast. Ancient. Rising from the deep beneath his fleet.
"One-Eye…" Laenor breathed, cursing himself for forgetting the kraken that swam in his shadow. The creature stirred, answering his summons before he had even formed the thought. With a crack that shook the fleet, tentacles vast as towers tore free of the ocean, writhing upward. A sound like thunder — a roar from the abyss — rolled out from the depths. The crew inside screamed, some in panic, some in fear. The beast did not yet surface, but its presence alone split the sea.
Laenor's knuckles whitened on his trident, ready to command his kraken— but then the world itself split.
The sound came first: a tearing, like silk ripped across the heavens.
Above the storms, a veil shimmered. Thin, translucent, like glass stretched across infinity. But the sheer magic that Laenor could feel was astronomical; it was endless, condensed so much that fabric would be larger than it. For the briefest heartbeat, Laenor saw beyond it — and what he glimpsed froze his blood. Shapes vast and alien, screaming in rage, their forms too large for the mind to hold. The Three. Gods hurled backward into darkness, clawing at the veil as they vanished.
Then it was gone.
The veil sealed.
The storms broke apart like smoke. The clouds fled. Lightning winked out. The rain ceased. The waves flattened, the sea turning eerily still. And then — sunlight. Blinding sunlight, as though none of it had ever been. White clouds drifted lazily overhead. The water was calm as glass.
Laenor lowered his trident, chest heaving, his body trembling with exhaustion. He scanned the horizon, desperate for any trace that what had just happened was real — but there was nothing. Only stillness. Only peace.
He stood alone at the prow, salt stinging his lips, the sun burning his eyes. The battle was over. He had lived.
But he would never again call the gods weak. Assume it even.
He had seen their power with his own eyes here. And he swore, by the sea itself, that next time he faced them — he would not, will not be unprepared.
At the same time, The Citadel, Oldtown
The Citadel of Oldtown rose vast and many-towered upon the Honeywine, its grey halls and bridges knit together like a great stone hive of learning. Countless windows gleamed pale in the afternoon light, but the highest tower claimed the sky. The Hightower loomed taller, aye, yet the Citadel's own tower was crowned with a chamber few men had ever seen.
At its summit lay the Conclave, a round hall ringed with narrow arched windows. The walls were of pale stone, so smooth they caught the light of day and turned it silver. Around the circumference, twelve tall chairs of carved oak stood, each marked by the linked chain of a different metal. Beneath them, the floor was inlaid with a great mosaic of the seven-pointed star, its colors dulled by age and the soot of a hundred years of torches. The air within smelled faintly of vellum and melted wax.
Here the archmaesters gathered when grave matters pressed upon the realm, and today was such a day. Robes of grey shifted and whispered against the floor as the old men took their places, chains heavy about their shoulders, each link gleaming with a hue of knowledge—black iron, yellow gold, pale silver, Valyrian steel. At the chamber's center stood the lectern of cedarwood, high enough that a man might rest both hands upon it when he spoke. Above, the roof was domed with leaded glass, through which the late sun cast long beams that painted each archmaester in a different shade.
When the doors closed, the noise of Oldtown was shut away. Within that circle of chains and learning, only quills and whispers mattered. Greetings were exchanged, the old men nodding and murmuring as they settled into their seats, each pausing to regain his breath. The climb to this chamber was no easy task, even for men far younger.
Soon, each pair of eyes turned toward the Archmaester of healing and herblore. The Seneschal was the first to speak. "Can we assume that the task entrusted to you is done and delivered?" His blue eyes fixed on Archmaester Androw, sharp and prodding.
"Aye, Seneschal," Androw replied. "It has been delivered to our raven and is already on its way to the North. I also took the liberty of testing it before it is put to use. The results exceeded my expectations." A thin smile crept across his lips. Though Archmaester of healing, Androw's interest had ever lain not in cures but in poisons.
"Good," the Seneschal said gravely. "It must work as it always has. The risk is too great. We cannot afford to let that boy return to his island. He has grown too quickly. True Valyrian, that one." Worry and disgust warred upon the old man's weary face.
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