"I was born to rule the Seven Kingdoms, and I will."
Alyna Targaryen has never known the sweet shores of Westeros. She has spent her days in Braavos, living life like a princess in debt to the Sealord.
What will happen when destiny takes her to the...
"All hands hoay!" yelled Captain Hyrmon as the weak dawn broke across the large dark mountainous ranges that surrounded the Great Port of Asshai. As Alyna was taken to the deck, chained and broken, thrust into a cage and prepared for transport into the city, she found that the city was almost exactly as Jhaga had told her. She couldn't see much in the twilight that seemed to eternally eclipse the city, however, she could spy no more than ten freemen- and women prowling the port markets. Some of them were riding in carts, others in elaborate palanquins carved with dragonglass and gold — all were heaved by slaves.
Jhaga had told her that no animals could live in Asshai, any taken by ship soon died from strange illnesses and rot of the mind, this was the reason that the Shadow City was so dependent on the slave trade. They had such a minute population that they relied on slaves to keep their shell of a city running. There were churches and halls, libraries and manses travelling halfway up one of the mighty mountains that sat on the precipice of the Shadow Lands. Only one in ten of those buildings had a light coming from their window, and there were no crowds in the streets, no children playing, nothing.
Alyna held tightly to the hand of one of the Dothraki slave girls, a girl of five and ten who had been taken from her home in Lhazar by Khal Temmo on his way to Meereen. Her name was Jeshi and she had a pretty face — she had been called Little Lamb by Jhaga, a nickname meant to comfort the girl but coming from a man of the Dothraki it was hard for Jeshi not to take it as a backhanded insult. Alyna had tried to accumulate the girl to the nickname, and perhaps with time she would come to take pride in her roots as a girl of Lhazar. They were a modest folk, but honourable and good at heart — they didn't deserve even half of what the Dothraki and Ghiscari reaped of them.
"Do not worry, Jeshi," Alyna said as she gripped the Lhazarene's hand with a comfort smile. The Targaryen had feigned bravery for the rest of the slaves so far, perhaps she could do it for a little while longer to help Jeshi in whatever awaited them in Asshai. "No matter what, I'll be with you. I promise to keep you safe," said the flaxen-haired princess as she looked at Jhaga with an uneasy look in her eye. Jeshi was ignorant to the look and she took some of Alyna's courage for her own. Jhaga sat in silence and thought — there was little need for slaves so old, this had got him wondering exactly what they had all been purchased for back on the flesh marts of Meereen.
"Jhaga, what can you tell us of this place?" asked Alyna as their large cage was reared off the deck of the Ballahou. A few of the slaves who were fit and healthy walked on either side of the cage, their shackles chained to the cage so as they would not fall behind — if they did, they would receive a sharp scourge from one of the pirate overseers accompanying them to whoever it was paying for their purchase. Alyna had tried to picture the mysterious buyer she had heard so much about on the seafare from Meereen. She had pictured a highborn lord or lady, a shadow hidden behind a horrifying mask of the Shadow Men and donned in drab robes of black and blue.
The Woman...the Woman from Meereen. She had been wearing a red lacquered mask, she had been dressed in robes of the Shadow Men. She told me I'd be safe...with her.
Alyna tried to think back to the woman, to her voice, but she couldn't quite remember. When she searched her memories she could only find a blurry haze where the woman should have been, a static image in a sea of pictures of the past. She told me I'd be safe. What did she mean?, Alyna thought, her mind racing a thousand leagues at a time. She didn't know anything more to say to either Jeshi or Jhaga, for they were now deep in the heart of Asshai and they had yet to slow down.
"Your in for a treat," said one of the young pirates from the Basilisk Isles. He had been one of the men whom had terrorised Jeshi and Jhaga their entire journey, they had thought the elderly man was good for nothing but to feed the fishes — they would have loved to have seen him thrown overboard, but Captain Hyrmon had forbade it. Their buyer had paid for all off them, not just ninety-nine. Alyna had tried to ignore them, they likely knew nothing of where they were going, and just a little more of the city of Asshai. They were young boys in truth, brought up by the wrong crowd in service to the Corsair King. If they were under different circumstances and Alyna was not at the mercy of their cruelty, she may have even felt sorry for them.
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"Out, the lot of you!" yelled Captain Hyrmon as he arrived with some more of his crew, wielding their crooked steel and donning their black attire. They looked like some madman from a children's tale told to her by her wetnurse, but they were very much real. Alyna had the bruises to prove it, the pictures in her mind and the words in her ears. As Hyrmon barked his orders, two of his subordinates opened the large cage and began to pull out the slaves one by one, the ground was slick and hard so each time one of the slaves would fall Alyna could hear their cries of pain.
"Careful with this one lad," said the Captain as one of the boys tried to rough Alyna onto the ground, "we've been told not to hurt this one. I assume whoever's buyin' likes 'em pretty," he said with a snigger as he closed the cage behind the Targaryen and hurried her into the large and daunting building that they had spent so long travelling towards.
It was a huge tower, with carvings and gargoyles stationed outside like watchdogs keeping a close eye on all who dared enter. There were carvings and engravings of snowflakes and icicles all over, the room had its own chill and it felt as though the very spirit of winter was within its walls. Alyna felt as though she had the eyes of a thousand thousands weary watchers on her as soon as she crossed the threshold, the cold sent shivers down her spine and caused her flesh to grow bumpy and her hairs to stand on end.
She was wearing nothing other than Dothraki garb, thrown to her as a second thought by one of the slave masters so that they may keep her noble clothes from Braavos. Alyna had been given that dress by Jynos just a moon turn before she had fled from his city, her last possession to remember him by...the man who raised her. Had she just listened to him and gone through with her marriage to the Archon, perhaps she'd be safe in some Tyroshi palace by now.
Alyna and her fellow enslaved were marched inside the great tower, the men of the Ballahou still kept watch over them, the shackles of the Dothraki warriors rattled with each step they took that brought them further and further into the basement and into the belly of the beast. She could feel an uneasy shake in the chains, in front of her was Hanni but she had no idea where Jhaga was.
It wasn't until they had been settled in their holding place until she found him again. The old Dothrak had been marched at the head of the line, the shaking was his own as he descended under the earth and into pure darkness. There was no torches lit as he stumbled down the steps, the seamen had only thought to do so after they had been taken to their cells.
Jhaga looked at Alyna, his face was pale and his eyes were filled with shock and what could only be fear. The Targaryen trusted the man and his gut, but she didn't know why he was as fearful as he was — witches, he said. There was only one thing the Dothraki truly feared other than the black salt sea, and that was witches. According to Jhaga, none other would operate in such a depraved place...
