The night before the wedding, Pentos glittered.
Torches burned in every courtyard of Illyrio's manse. Musicians filled the warm air with pipes and drums. Slaves hurried beneath the weight of platters heavy with roasted meats and sugared fruits. The Dothraki drank fermented mare's milk and laughed like thunder.
Laena stood apart from it all.
Her wedding silks had been laid out across a long cedar table — crimson gauze, black embroidery in curling Valyrian patterns, thin chains of gold meant to drape over her shoulders like liquid sunlight. A collar shaped like dragon wings waited to be clasped at her throat.
She touched none of it.
Behind her, soft footsteps.
"Laena?"
Daenerys.
Laena turned. Her sister hovered near the doorway, pale hands twisted in the fabric of her simple gown. Dany's violet eyes were wide, searching.
"They say the Dothraki wedding is..." Dany swallowed. "Violent."
Laena's mouth curved faintly.
"A Dothraki wedding without at least three deaths is considered a dull affair."
Dany's expression faltered. "You're not afraid?"
Laena studied her sister for a long moment.
"I am not made of glass, Dany."
"I know," Dany whispered. "That's what frightens me."
That almost made Laena laugh.
She crossed the room and cupped Dany's face gently — a rare softness in her touch. "Listen to me. You were never meant for this life. If Viserys had sent you, it would have devoured you."
"And you?" Dany asked.
Laena's eyes flickered — silver in torchlight.
"I intend to devour it first."
Dany shivered, though not entirely from fear.
When she left, the room felt quieter. Smaller.
Laena turned back to the waiting silks and began to dress.
⸻
The wedding feast exploded like war.
Two men died before the first course was finished — one gutted over a spilled drink, another trampled beneath panicked horses when a fight spilled into the open courtyard. Blood slicked the packed earth. No one stopped dancing.
The Dothraki cheered.
Laena did not look away.
Seated beside Khal Drogo on a raised platform, she watched it all with cool fascination. The violence did not disturb her.
It clarified things.
The world was not cruel.
It was honest.
Drogo observed her from the corner of his eye. He had expected flinching. Disgust. Weakness.
Instead, the foreign bride watched blood soak into the dirt as if measuring it.
When a severed ear landed near her feet, she calmly nudged it aside with her sandal.
Drogo's lips twitched.
Later, when Illyrio presented the traditional bridal gifts — silks, weapons, a pale silver horse — Laena ran her hand down the horse's neck, whispering softly in Valyrian. The animal stilled beneath her touch.
Drogo noticed that too.
She was not soft.
She was not fragile.
She was something else.
Something that reminded him of wildfire glimpsed across dry grasslands — beautiful, unstoppable, dangerous to approach.
When the sun dipped low, the ceremony itself was brief. Words spoken in Dothraki. Promises of strength. Of sons. Of conquest.
Laena did not understand every word.
She understood enough.
When it was done, Drogo lifted her easily, placing her before him on his great black stallion.
The khalasar roared approval.
No carriage. No escort.
Just open land beyond the city gates.
Laena did not look back at Pentos.
She did not look back at Viserys.
⸻
They rode until the torches of the city were swallowed by darkness.
The only light came from the rising moon and distant campfires of the khalasar spreading like constellations across the grass sea.
Drogo dismounted first.
He did not rush her.
He stood before her, assessing.
She met his gaze steadily.
In the silence between them, there was no translator. No brother. No watching nobles.
Only breath.
Only heat.
He reached out and took her chin between his fingers, tilting her face toward him. Testing.
Laena stepped closer instead of back.
A challenge.
His hand tightened slightly.
She lifted her own and traced one of the scars on his chest — slowly, deliberately — as if cataloging the story it told.
His breath deepened.
"You think to tame me?" she asked softly.
He did not understand the words — but he understood the tone again.
Dominance.
Defiance.
He placed his forehead against hers, eyes dark.
Laena closed the distance first.
It was not submission.
It was decision.
The grass whispered around them as the wind shifted.
Somewhere in the distance, a horse screamed.
And beneath the endless sky, dragon and stallion tested each other — not as master and prey, but as equals circling flame.
When Drogo finally pulled back, there was no mockery in his expression now.
Only respect.
And something dangerously close to hunger.
Laena felt it coil through her.
Good.
Let him see that she was not a frightened bride to be broken.
Let him learn that dragons do not break.
They burn.
⸻
As the khalasar settled for the night, whispers spread among the riders.
The foreign khaleesi had not cried.
She had not begged.
She had looked at their khal as if she were measuring him for a crown.
And in the quiet dark beyond the fires, Laena Targaryen lay awake beside the most powerful khal in the Great Grass Sea — not afraid of what she had married.
But eager.
For the first time since exile, the blood in her veins felt alive.
The grasslands stretched endless and waiting.
So did conquest.
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Savage Blood
FanfictionA warrior does not give up what she loves, she finds the love in what she does. ...
