Night withdrew. Dawn's first light bled across drifting veils of cloud, soft and dreamlike.
Nohat shook the weariness from his frame, searching for the tracks his tribe had left behind. Yet all about him the fields lay lush and green, and the sight made his head swim. He had ridden until his strength was spent, until every companion had fallen behind. Only he pressed on.
Through blurred eyes he thought he glimpsed riders again, hooves drumming nearer. This time it was no mirage—the sharp ring of horses' hooves was all too real.
A breath of morning wind, a blaze of rosy dawn—
"Who goes there?"
The shout roused him from half-sleep. His hand darted for the arakh at his hip, but his fingers found only air. The world jolted beneath him. With a start he realized he lay not on grass but in the bed of a moving cart.
"Steward… the enemy…"
He saw the man riding alongside the cart—Orvo, the khal's steward—and tried to rise, desperate to deliver his tidings. But Orvo pressed him back with a hand.
"They have found us, have they not? They ride for the tribe?"
Nohat, pale with exhaustion, nodded. "We rode west from the Syhoru, seeking their trail. Found nothing. Yet they are sixty thousand horse—no army can hide such numbers. Twice we met their scouts upon the road to the Vhalaena. They have not gone to the Wastes. Nor to the Syhoru. They are riding southwest—toward the Vhalaena, and toward us."
Orvo sighed and clasped his shoulder. "You have done well, warrior. Rest now. From your wounds and your weary face, I see enough. The enemy draws near. Our tribe has one day less to prepare."
Leaving him, Orvo spurred his horse to the rear of the column.
There he found Maester Bas Port, staring absently at the flight of birds, at passers-by, even at beasts in the fields. At the steward's approach the maester muttered, half to himself:
"How do they track us? No spies, no scouts trailing our march. Could it be a skinchanger? Yet only in Westeros, among the First Men and the wildlings who keep the Old Gods, do such powers stir. How could a Dothraki possess such a gift?"
A skinchanger could slip into the minds of beasts, and bend them to his will. Among the Children of the Forest, their greenseers were the mightiest of all, said to walk in any creature.
Orvo had no patience for such mysteries. "Then it is not skinchanging. We must seek another cause."
"Another cause…?" Bas Port's brow furrowed. His eyes flicked to the passing women and children of the khalasar, shining with unease. Then he cried out: "A stallion. Blood. Blood magic—or divination!"
The word struck Orvo like a lash. The Dothraki abhorred such powers, unclean and unnatural. Yet he remembered too well the blood-soaked stallion they had seen, half-buried in mud.
"Yes… it fits," the maester said, wide-eyed. He swung into his saddle. "Only we two have seen that mother and child. You go forward. I'll ride back. Find the stallion—we must!"
Meanwhile, to the south of the Vhalaena.
The sun broke red over Volantis. The earth itself seemed to quake beneath the thunder of hooves.
Möngke rode at the head, a fire-red charger beneath him, his proud figure first to pierce the gaze of the city's sentries. Behind him came a flood, three and thirty thousand strong, the khalasar roaring like a storm tide.
"A wall no storm can break," thought the guards upon the Black Walls. Yet Möngke himself felt the weight of it—the massive stones bristling with scorpions, catapults, engines of war.
At a thousand paces he drew rein, his riders halting as one, their mastery plain for all to see.
He rode the line slowly, calmly, eyes sweeping the defenses. Behind him the dawn bloomed crimson across the sky. Volantis' bells tolled in alarm, shattering the fragile peace of morning.
Möngke turned to the rising sun, raised his whip high, and thundered:
"Bloodriders of the Dothraki!"
The shout shook the heavens. Thirty thousand voices answered, a storm of steel and rage. Arakhs lifted like a forest of silver, their roars rolling like thunder, a sound to chill the heart of any man who heard it.
The khal wheeled his horse. At his signal the great horde turned north, a tide flowing away from the walls.
For the Black Walls encircled only the Old City, where the nobles dwelled. East of the Rhoyne, the sprawl of homes and taverns, docks and markets lay unprotected. There was Volantis in truth—yet slaughter and pillage were not his aim. He sought only to camp north of the city, to hold Volantis in check while his tribes across the Vhalaena raised their defenses.
Still, the khal wasted no time. He had made it habit to read the land at every halt. That was a commander's duty.
There before him lay a broad road, half a foot above the earth, paved in black volcanic stone, straight as a spear northward. Möngke reined in, astonished.
"The Valyrian Way," he whispered.
It was not on any map he knew. Volantis was said to have but one such road, eastward to the cities of Slaver's Bay. But here was another, leading north—leading to the Vhalaena.
"You see true," said a voice at his side.
The red priest Makkiro bowed low, his manner unctuous, his tone fervent. "Great Khal Möngke, I come by command of the High Priest, and by the will of the Lord of Light, to serve you."
The khal's lip curled. He remembered too well the priest's past deceit. His hand strayed to the dragonbone hilt at his side.
But he only smiled, cold and mild. "Then speak, priest. Tell me of this road—its making, and where it leads."