Chapter 79: The King in the North and the Dragon's Roar
The flight from the smoldering ruins of the Neck to the ancient keep of Winterfell was a journey of a few short hours for Balerion. As they streaked north, the landscape changed dramatically. The green of the Riverlands gave way to the cold, snow-dusted forests and frozen rivers of the North. Maegor, mounted on the divine beast, felt a strange, almost comforting wave of nostalgia wash over him. This was his home. Not the opulent halls of Dragonstone he had read about, nor the sun-baked plains of Essos where he had forged his power, but the harsh, unforgiving cold that had shaped his very being. The biting wind felt like a forgotten friend, and the vast, white expanse of the northern lands felt more familiar than any palace in Qehes.
Balerion, now a living monument to fire and might, landed with a ground-shaking impact just outside the ancient walls of Winterfell. His colossal form, black as night against the pale snow, cast a shadow that fell over the entire castle. The air, already cold, seemed to drop further in temperature from the sheer shock of his presence.
Inside Winterfell's great courtyard, the scene was one of grim determination. A sea of grim-faced Northerners, bearing the sigils of various houses—the direwolf of Stark, the bear of Mormont, the flayed man of Bolton (now under a new, less traitorous lord, perhaps), and a hundred other banners—were drilling, preparing for the inevitable southern invasion. They were a people battered by war, their King dead, their hopes pinned on a new, unproven leader.
Their drilling ceased abruptly as a collective gasp of disbelief rippled through the ranks. They stared, a thousand faces frozen in shock and awe, at the impossible sight before them. The legends, the bedtime stories told to frighten children, had come to life.
A figure dismounted from the dragon's back. He was tall, with the legendary silver-white hair and deep purple eyes. At his hip, he carried a longsword of impossible darkness, a blade that seemed to drink the very light. Maegor Targaryen.
He stood before them, a conqueror, a king, a living myth. The Northern lords, grim and hardened as they were, did not immediately drop to their knees. They had seen dragons before, in a way. Their children had heard the tales. They were born stubborn, bred on hardship, and fear was not their first instinct. They were survivors. Their hands, however, went to the hilts of their swords.
Maegor's voice, amplified by his Royal Authority (Uncommon) and Conquest Aura (Epic), boomed out across the courtyard, a challenge to their defiance.
"People of the North! I am Maegor Targaryen! King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men! Lord of the Seven Kingdoms!" he roared, his voice laced with the fury of his ancestors. "You have forgotten your history! You have forgotten to kneel before your King!"
He took a step forward, his gaze sweeping over their defiant faces. "The last King in the North, Torrhen Stark, chose to save his people from the righteous fire of the Dragon! He chose wisely! He bent the knee to Aegon the Conqueror, rather than watch his kingdom burn!"
Maegor turned and gestured to Balerion. The colossal dragon, sensing his master's intent, let out a roar. It was not a growl, nor a shriek, but a sound of pure, unadulterated power. It was a roar that spoke of fire and ash, of castles melting to ruin, of kings broken and cities razed. The very ground seemed to tremble beneath the sound. The air filled with a sense of immense, suffocating dread.
"That," Maegor's voice thundered, "is the sound of a King! That is the reason Torrhen Stark knelt! And that is the reason you will kneel!"
His gaze, cold and unyielding, fixed on the leader of the Northerners, the young man who stood at the front of the formation, his own black hair and grim face a testament to his Northern upbringing. He was no longer just Jon Snow, the bastard of Winterfell. He was the King in the North, the white dragon. And in his hand, a small, dark shape—a newly born dragon, no bigger than a horse, its eyes wide with a mix of terror and nascent fury.
Maegor's mission was not just about saving his kin. It was about reminding the entire North of who truly commanded the dragons, and who truly commanded the throne.