Fire and Blood

Chapter 152: Attack on the Dragonpit (Part 1)

King's Landing ― Dragonpit...

The clang of the iron bars still thrummed through the passageway like the final toll of a doomed city bell tolling somewhere on Rhaenys's Hill. Only Aemma's ragged breathing, the distant crackle of burning King's Landing, and the faint, almost mournful clatter of chains deeper in the hill remained. She pressed her back to the rough stone, one palm over her bruised ribs. Pain lanced beneath her fingers; cracked or only battered, she could not tell. "Seven save me," she muttered, then corrected herself—"Sīkudi āeksia," she whispered, the Valyrian syllables tasting of copper and smoke. 

The mob outside—a rabid horde driven by the Shepherd's sermons and Larys Strong's invisible strings—howled in frustration, rattling the bars, claws of hungry beasts. Fists hammered the gate; picks and spades scraped at the clay where stone met earth, howling for Targaryen blood. A shovel-head wedged under the sill, prying at loose mortar. Another iron shank probed for purchase, but the Dragonkeepers had built these postern defenses strongly to keep intruders out. They would hold long enough. 

Not much time. Hold on, Silverwing. I'm coming.

A torch bracketed to the entrance gave feeble light. Aemma seized it, limped forward, and found the familiar hewn ascent—a cork-screw stair worn smooth by three centuries of Dragonkeepers' boots. Warm air rolled down from the vaulted cavern above, tinged with the unmistakable musk of dragons: hot stone, charred straw, and an under-scent like lightning before a storm. A fresh tremor rattled dust from the vaulted ceiling. Somewhere above, thousands of zealots—the Shepherd's flock—surged up the hill, twenty thousand strong at the riot's height, still more than enough to drown the Dragonpit in blood. Aemma pictured their torches bobbing in the dark like a living sea of hatred. She limped deeper. Each step jarred her sprained ankle, but stopping meant death—for her, for the dragons, for the House Targaryen.

A branch corridor opened on Aemma's right. Light poured from it—steady, golden, civilized. She limped toward it, hand pressed to her ribs. The passage widened into an antechamber cluttered with barrels of lamp oil, bales of straw, and racks of rusty tools. Halfway up the incline, she slipped, palm skidding in coarse sand. In the grit lay a scattering of scales—pale, broken bits no larger than coins. Dragonscale. Recent. Some keeper had swept out a stall and left his sweepings here in haste. That meant she was close. Closer still came another sound: boot-leather scuffing stone ahead. Aemma ducked into a shadowed alcove, forcing herself to still her breath. Torchlight licked across the curve of the ramp, and three Dragonkeepers appeared. Their faces were pinched with fear.

"Lāelōt iā brozi iā emel? (Are the doors holding?)" The eldest whispered.

"Vestragon... yn iā konīr vāedas. (For now... but a breach is coming.)"

Aemma moved silently between them, slipping into the first gallery after overhearing the Dragonkeepers mention another crowd heading towards the Dragonpit from the front. Her heart raced—this was a dire sign. The Shepherd's flock was ahead, with pursuers hot on their heels, desperate to break through. If Aemma couldn't find Silverwing or the main lever to unlock the chains binding each dragon, their chances of survival would be grim. Light fell here in fractured pillars from the ruined dome far above—moonlight, smoke-light, and the spitting glow of braziers lining a causeway that circled the pit's yawning bowl. The Dragonpit always smelled of forge and furnace, but tonight the reek was worse, laced with fear. Chains groaned. A distant roar reverberated up through vaults—a bass note that fluttered dust from rafters. Silverwing.

Aemma's breath hitched. Her ribs felt wrapped in hot wire, each gasp tearing new threads. Just... reach her. But first, convince the keepers who still barred the pens.