#;transmissions

House Bla.ckwood House Da.yne & House Sta.rk House Ma.rtell House R.ogare of L.ys House Ve.laryon & House Co.rbray House B.ar.ath.eon

And, then, high above the castle, Laira hears the cracking of wings and a thundering roar. The ire that she can sense in her dragonmount is as stifling as the heat now emanating through the small space about her.

“Peace, Queen Laira,” the woman speaks, her High Valyrian melodic. Slowly, she begins to shift, body turning until she faces the Queen. “I mean you no harm.”

For a brief moment, Laira’s hold strengthens all the more about Dark Sister’s grip. Recognition slowly descends upon her as she stares across the solar at the other woman, the other’s raven hair and emerald eyes a stark contrast to her pale skin. It has been a time since she has seen the woman. Over a year, in fact, if Laira is remembering correctly. Such an encounter had first occurred only days before Drogon had spirited Daenerys away from the sands of The Great Pit of Daznak in Meereen.

She had encountered the Red Priestess another time as well, though, mere hours before Laira had freed Viserion and Rhaegal from the pit beneath the Great Pyramid and abandoned Meereen on Viserion’s back to search for Daenerys.

“Kinvara,” she finally acknowledges, the name of the other rising quickly in her mind. Her fingers begin to slacken around Dark Sister’s handle. The sword still remains in hand. Familiarity does not mean an absence of threat, after all. Laira has learned such a lesson in the most horrific of ways in recent moons.

The priestess inclines her head, a brief smile tugging at the edges of her burgundy painted mouth. “Your Grace,” Kinvara returns, lapsing into the Common Tongue of Westeros. Her hands fold themselves at her middle, fingers steepling together as the sleeves of her robes slip to cover them. “I offer my sincerest apologies for startling you as I have.”

Such fright and such distrust is well deserved, Kinvara knows. Her Lord has shown her all that has awaited the Dragon Queens since they departed the Cities of the East and landed upon the shores of the Sunset Kingdoms. Deceit and betrayal has befallen each of them in some manner, expertly crafted and executed by the most devilish of mummers.

It is such treachery that has sent Kinvara across the Narrow Seas to these very shores.

“Had you presented yourself to my maids, such an occurrence would not have happened,” Laira points out. High above the castle, she hears another snap of wings and Viserion’s wrothful sounding roar. To hear such a sound from the dragoness is not uncommon about the island. Viserion does not circle so low about the castle often, though. Only to land within the gardens or when she is catching the wind to ascend over the Dragonmont.

Such behavior would alert her husband, and the rest of the castle staff, that there was something amiss.

And Hal, in his protective nature, would come seeking her.

“You are correct, Your Grace,” Kinvara relents. “I assure you my intentions were pure.” Her voice is solemn as she speaks, the corners of her mouth turning down at its corners. “I regret to say that the occupants of this castle and those upon the island hold little favor for the Lord of Light and his servants.”

The tale is not a new one. Laira has heard the whispers among the halls and down among the occupants of the village since she first landed upon the island. Stannis Baratheon had once kept a Red Priestess among his court. The woman had garnered a dark reputation in the time that she had spent upon the island, burning men alive to appease the Red God and to bring favor to the man she had thought to be the Realm’s rightful King.

None upon the island held any favor for her. Most, in fact, feared her and dared not even utter the Red Woman’s name.

“A raven would have sufficed to announce your arrival,” Laira returns. Dark Sister is raised as she speaks and slipped back into the safety of her scabbard. Still, Laira keeps the sword in hand. “I would have known to expect you, then, and would have properly prepared the members of my staff for your arrival.” Better ways were available to her than the one that Kinvara had chosen to use. There is little to be done about it now. The woman is within her walls. Laira cannot very well send her away for an unorthodox arrival.

She cannot say the same for her husband, though. He will not be pleased when he learns of Kinvara’s presence or the manner in which she obtained her audience with Laira. It will take a great deal of convincing to allow the other woman to linger if that is her desire.

“Ravens can be intercepted, Your Grace,” Kinvara reminds. “Given the betrayal that has tormented you and your sisters, I thought it best to keep my journeys well guarded. There are those who would sow seeds of distrust among the High Lords of Westeros if they knew you were holding audience with a Priestess of R’hllor.”

There is no rebuttal that Laira can offer to such an answer… not when the other’s words ring with such utter truth. Betrayal had met Daenerys and her at every turn when they resided within the walls of Meereen.

“As you say,” Laira murmurs. She begins to move, making to circle around the edge of her desk. Her amethyst eyes are ever watchful. Kinvara’s own emerald gaze is much the same, though her eyes seem to crinkle at their corners with some underlying amusement. “You stated that there was much in need of discussing,” Laira continues, referencing the cryptic greeting the other had given when Laira had appeared within the doorway of the solar.

She does not reference the moniker that Kinvara has only just referred to her by.

It is not the first time that Laira has heard the name Daughter of Death. It is the first time that another has referred to her as such, though. The name had been whispered to Daenerys while in the House of the Undying within the famed walls of Qarth. That was what her sister had told her. The name means nothing to her.

“Much and more, Your Grace,” Kinvara concedes, offering another dip of her head. “Would you care to wait for your lord husband?” the priestess asks.

“How do you know of my husband?” the Queen asks. The question is quick and more demand than inquiry. Unease suddenly begins to beat wildly within her heart, fanning out into her limbs and settling deep within her bones.

Upon Dragonstone, her marriage is well known. The staff among the castle down to the occupants of the village know who Hal is and how wholly he is linked to Laira and all that she is. She has never shied away from proclaiming the man for what he is. Her husband. Prince Consort of Dragonstone, much to his chagrin. Protector of the Realm. Warden of the North and Lord of Winterfell. The small nature of Dragonstone is different from the intricate politics of court among the walls of the Red Keep and beyond, though. And, it is in such delicate settings that both she and her husband have guarded the secret far more.

Not well enough, it seems, when viewed behind the treachery and betrayal they have endured.

All the same, there should have been no whispers of her marriage across the Narrow Sea. Not when she and Hal married amid Winterfell’s godswood with only a septon and young Sansa and Helen as witnesses. And, not when the Spider had seen his own end when Daenerys had ascended her rightful throne.

“The Lord of Light reveals all in his own time,” Kinvara says, turning to cast a look back into the flames dancing within the solar’s hearth. The fire momentarily sweeps upward, thin tendrils of flame reaching out to swirl at the hem of the priestess’s robes. “History has shown that the Wolf always finds his way back to you, Your Grace. The trials and the challenges that await you both always means little to him.”

Her Lord is always certain that his will is done, weaving threads of destiny into a tapestry that even Kinvara herself has yet to be able to decipher. Kinvara has ever served her Lord, though, faithful and devout through the destruction of empires and the darkness of the first Long Night.

And, yet, the meeting of Dragon and Wolf has been an ever constant thread, recurring time and time again in her Lord’s woven work.

Emerald eyes glance about the solar, settling for a moment on the Queen and the Valyrian blade still clasped in her palm. Her gaze moves just as easily, looking to the chests and trunks stacked along the solar’s walls. She has already looked through one of the journals upon the Queen’s desk. The Lyseni craftsmanship is as intricate and as lovely as she remembered it being a century before when it had been freshly crafted.

Even in her youth, the Star of the Sea had always possessed immaculate tastes.

Something in the priestess’s words strikes her as odd, lingers over her in a way that she cannot immediately place. There is a familiarity to them… as if she has heard them before.

“A peculiar thing to say,” Laira murmurs, her amethyst gaze following the priestess’s own about the room. Her eyes linger upon the portrait that had started all of this searching, the very one that still seems to Laira more mirror than painting. Though half hidden by a cotton sheet and cast in heavy shadow, Laira can still spy the likeness of Visenya Targaryen and little Saera looking back at her.

“To some,” Kinvara agrees. Now, she steps, moving around the far edges of the Queen’s desk. She leaves the other ample space, head bowed in quiet thought and hands clasped gently at her front. Her Lord has shown her all she needs to know of this Dragon Queen. She is a stark contrast to her Velaryon and Targaryen half sisters, with her height, her olive skin, and her Jaydian accent. Perhaps mannerisms separate her the most, however. Quiet and reserved where her sisters are not. As lethal on foot with Valyrian steel as she is high among the clouds mounted upon her dragoness.

She is dangerous in the most obvious --and subtle-- of ways. Kinvara knows it is wise to not forget such a thing.

“Perhaps it is presumptuous of me, Your Grace, yet you do not seem bothered by such a peculiar statement,” Kinvara comments, pausing before one of the armchairs that are set before the Queen’s desk.

Laira maintains her own position, eyes still observing the path that Kinvara chooses to take. “It is not the first time another has spoken in such a peculiar manner to me,” she says. There is still something that is lingering over her, something that is now tugging gently at the back of her mind. Some forgotten conversation, perhaps… or a memory. “The City of the Harpy was filled with riddlers and silver tongued wretches alike. They all flocked to my sister’s court, spinning tales to endear themselves to Daenerys and to condemn those that had been stricken from bondage.”

More had come to Daenerys long before then, when her sister had dwelt among the walls of Qarth and before even then among the walls of Illyrio Mopatis’ manse in Pentos. The Pentoshi Magister, Daenerys had once told her, had been the most dangerous of them all. Laira had never doubted her sister’s word regarding such a thing. After all, the Magister had been linked to the Usurper’s Spider, a willing collaborator to see Daenerys slain and some bastard born boy seated upon the Iron Throne in her place. That they had attempted such a ploy under the claim that the boy was Rhaegar’s son, Aegon, had been all the crueler. Nothing good had ever come from the poison and the chaos that Varys and his little birds had spun so deftly among the residents of the Red Keep. Nothing good had ever come from Illyrio’s honeyed words and false promises. Daenerys had been right to see them both ended for their treachery.

“Indeed,” Kinvara relents. “Yet, what need would I have for sweet words or riddles in your presence, Your Grace?” she questions.

“What better way to seek favor from me? What better way to gain something that you desire?” Laira is not fool enough to believe that Kinvara has traveled so long a way to seek nothing of her. Little is done in their world without the desire for compensation.

Someone always desires something in return.

Someone always seeks more.

“And yet, Your Grace, there is nothing that I desire.”

“Everyone desires something, Kinvara,” Laira reminds. “From a Queen, such a thing is all the more true.”

Not even servants to R’hllor are immune from the siren song of greed.

“Of some, such a thing is true.” Kinvara cannot deny such a bitter truth. Their world has been built upon the greed of others. Kinvara has long been a witness to it, an observer since even before the fall of the Great Empire of the Dawn and the first Long Night. The nature of men has only worsened over the centuries, will only worsen until such nature is put to heel by another. Such a chance shall not be granted until the Queens’ enemies are vanquished. It is that very reason that has brought Kinvara to this island of storm, smoke, and salt. “I swear this to you, Your Grace,” she continues, hands unfolding from their place across her middle, “there is nothing that I desire from you. I wish to only see my Lord’s will done, to pass the knowledge that he has gifted to me on to you.”

“And nothing more?”

“Nothing more,” Kinvara answers. “I am a humble servant. Yours to command as you see fit, Your Grace.”

“And these matters that you wish to discuss,” Laira begins, stepping nearer to her desk. Dark Sister is leaned against the wood, still well within reach should the blade be needed. “Do they pertain to Visenya Targaryen and Torrhen Stark?” she asks. “Or Rhaena of Pentos and Corwyn Corbray?” she continues. Beyond the walls of her solar, Laira catches the sudden shift of shadow as something passes before the hearth within her apartments. There comes additional movement out beyond her doors, the sound of booted feet rushing down the stone lined hallway. “Perhaps Shiera Seastar and Donnor Stark?”

As she speaks, she notes the shifting of Kinvara’s expression. Still one of amusement and, yet, one of practical relief as well. Laira has little time to dwell upon such a thing, has little time to dwell upon some sort of vague understanding that continues to take shape inside her own mind. Before Kinvara can offer her own answer to her inquiries, there comes a growl from the doorway of her solar.

Moone appears but a moment later, hackles on end and teeth bared in a rare show of aggression. Her mismatched eyes find Kinvara, her form stalking into the room. There is a gnash of teeth in the Red Priestess’ direction, the she-wolf moving until she is standing between Laira and the other woman. Moone’s head rises to brush at Laira’s middle, her fur damp from where she has been washed and rinsed out among the gardens. Laira can feel the dampness beginning to soak through the fabric of her dress, can smell the soft scent of lemon and lavender upon the air from the soap that has been used to bathe her.

“The Amethyst Empress and the Last Hero,” Kinvara continues, eyes never abandoning the she-wolf that has prowled her way into the solar or the woman that she now stands before as a living shield. It is a show of protectiveness that Kinvara has seen time and time again during the course of her long life. It will be one that she will no doubt continue to see so long as this thread within her Lord’s tapestry continues to repeat. She will welcome it whenever she is granted the opportunity to see it. “As I said, Your Grace. Much and more.”

The names that Kinvara utters mean little to her – more mythological and legendary in their utterance than historical. Or, rather, the Last Hero means little to her. Laira knows them both, knows them as well as she knows the ancient deities of Old Valyria and those of Jayd. Though the Last Hero means little to her in this fleeting moment, Laira cannot say the same in regards to the Amethyst Empress.

Fragments of the journals and tomes she has read as of late spring to the forefront of her mind with Kinvara’s words, pieces that were of little matter on their own now resonating with some new found understanding.

The Five Forts.

The Great Empire of the Dawn.

The Blood Betrayal.

The Long Night.

There comes a sudden moment of clarity, one that strikes Laira just as she hears the rushing of booted feet entering her apartments. She knows, now… Knows the identity of the individual who penned a number of the journals she had skimmed that very morning before she, her husband, and their charges had departed for the coast just below the cliffs of the castle.

The Amethyst Empress. The last true ruler of the Great Empire of the Dawn. She is the one responsible for the recounts of the Great Empire and those of the Dragonlords in Valyria.

Laira knows… though cannot determine how the fabled Empress plays a role in the chaos and the betrayal that has erupted all about her, her husband, and her sisters in recent moons. In all her nightmares and in all of her dreams, the Amethyst Empress has never once played a part within any of them. Neither has the Last Hero.

“Laira!”

Her hand rises just as one of the doors to her solar is slammed all the more open, the wood and metal of it knocking loudly against the polished stone of the wall behind it. Though there had been no panic within her husband’s voice when he called for her, Laira can see the remnants of it in the square of his shoulders and in the clench of his jaw. She can see it in the way his hand has already settled upon the grip of Vigilance. She watches the way his eyes dart from her, to Moone, and then over to Kinvara, still standing quietly before her desk, before coming back to her and her growling guard.

“Hal,” she softly utters, drawing his attention fully to her, his eyes darting up to meet her own as her arm falls back to her side.

Laira does not miss the way that Kinvara’s mouth quirks into a knowing smile at such a reaction… as if the exchange she is observing is one she has been witness to a hundred times over. Perhaps she has. Would such a thing be beyond the realm of possibility given all that has happened and all that remains unknown before them?

“I am unharmed,” she goes on. Though she can see some of the tension leave his face, the line of his shoulders does not lessen nor does his grip upon the sword at his side. “Kinvara served Daenerys and myself in Meereen. She is no threat to me.” A lie, if Laira is truthful with herself. Perhaps Kinvara is no threat to Laira or to her husband in that moment, yet she is dangerous all the same.

Whether a dangerous enemy or a dangerous ally remained to be seen.

Kinvara inclines her head to the Lord of Winterfell as he steps fully into the solar, emerald eyes watching him as carefully as she has the Queen and her direwolf protector. Though the Queen’s temper has always been a difficult thing to rouse in all its fury, the Wolf Lord has ever been quick to anger and even quicker to react. Putting his lady in the way of any perceived danger has always provoked him all the more.

“Your Grace,” the Priestess greets. “As I have already told Her Grace, I apologize for alarming you as I have with my presence.”

“Were we aware of her arrival?” Hal asks, the inquiry aimed to Laira. He knows the answer before she even begins to speak the question. Had Kinvara been an expected guest upon Dragonstone’s shores, his wife would have told him. Given Viserion’s reaction high above the castle, and Moone’s as well out among the gardens and there within his wife’s solar, he knows that Laira was as surprised to find the woman among the walls of their apartments as he is.

“She came unannounced.” Laira will not lie over such a thing. Had Kinvara sent a raven announcing her travels to the island, Laira would have been certain to inform Hal of her coming. There had been no such correspondence, though… a matter that Kinvara has already readily admitted to in her earlier conversation. “The residents of the island and the staff among the castle have a fear of the Priestesses of R’hllor. She thought it best to limit the knowledge of her arrival.”

Once more, the words are anything but a lie. And although Laira can understand Kinvara’s reasoning behind her actions, she still does not agree with them. She can tell by her husband’s expression that he shares her discontent as well.

“Yet stealing into the apartments of the Crown Princess of Dragonstone and her husband is believed to be the more honorable path,” Hal returns, moving so he is able to stand at his wife’s side. He watches her as he draws closer, looking for any obivous signs of harm as he goes. For now, his search comes up empty. And, he sees no immediate signs of distress upon her face. “Such actions can be considered treasonous upon these shores.”

“Yes, Your Grace,” Kinvara agrees, her voice solemn as she offers another incline of her head. There is still the ghost of a smile crinkling the corners of her mouth, though, and the faintest hints of amusement reflected in her stare. “I have no defense beyond those Her Grace has already volunteered. Though it may not seem so, my actions were for the good of the occupants of this island and for Her Grace as well.” She turns her gaze to the Queen and then to the Lord of Winterfell. “I saw no need to add additional strife to that which you have both already weathered because of the Golden Roses taking root and overrunning King’s Landing.”

As quickly as the solar had grown warm, bitter cold seems to invade just as quickly. Laira reaches for her husband’s arm at Kinvara’s words, feels the way that his muscles have bunched beneath the fabric of his tunic. The tension in his face has returned, jaw clenched and brows pinching together as he stares down the Red Priestess across from the two of them.

Laira has seen such a look from him before, though only once and in the midst of war. Ramsay Bolton had made the dire mistake of threatening her while outside the walls of Winterfell. When given the opportunity, Hal had taken his head for the threat and for all the other horrors the man had inflicted upon the members of his family. Laira sees the very same look in him now, knows that if given the opportunity Kinvara could very well lose her head for daring to speak of the Tyrells and their plots within the capital.

When Kinvara had mentioned betrayal to her earlier in their exchange, Laira had thought her words were referencing Meereen… had thought she meant the Sons of the Harpy and the shadow games that had been played among the streets and high atop the pyramids of the Great Masters.

How wrong she had been, it seems.

“And what do you know of the Tyrells?” Laira questions, stepping into Hal’s side when he beckons her closer with a hand to her opposite hip. Perhaps the true question she should ask is how Kinvara knows of them.

Once more, there is the faintest hint of a smile upon Kinvara’s face when she begins speaking. “I believe such a question would be better answered among the course of our other discussion, Your Grace.” As she takes in the Dragon Queen and her Wolf Lord, she releases a soft hum. “Perhaps such a conversation would be better suited for the coming day,” she continues. “Your Graces will likely wish to speak with one another and to rest of your day among the shore.”

“Leave us then,” Hal orders, all the patience gone from his voice. There is more that he might say, more that he might order, yet he quiets when Laira murmurs softly up to him.

“I will have Mira prepare rooms for you,” Laira speaks, her thumb ghosting over the line of her husband’s forearm. She hopes that the action will help to soothe some of the anger that is raging just beneath his surface. “We can discuss these matters you have mentioned come morning.”

“I have no need for chambers, Your Grace,” Kinvara assures, offering one last incline of her head before making for the solar’s doors. “I will make myself at home within the library where I am less likely to be discovered by your staff. It has been a time since I have dwelt among its walls.”

When the Priestess is gone, there is only a beat of silence before Hal is turning to Laira. His hands go immediately to her face, palm settling against her cheeks as he looks over her for what feels like the hundredth time. Between them, Moone nudges her head against Laira’s stomach, growling softly.

“Are you alright?” he asks, thumb tracing along the line of her cheek. “Truly?”

Laira nods, smiling weakly up at him. “I am unharmed,” she promises, reaching to set her hand down across Moone’s muzzle. “Where are the girls?”

“Down in the kitchens with Mira and Ser Aeron.”

“Good,” she sighs, reaching to press her palms against her husband’s own. “Kinvara knows about what we have seen,” she says, eyes glancing to the journals and scrolls upon her desk. “She knows.”

“It could be a trick,” Hal reminds. “Some sort of treachery.”

Laira had thought similar things, had thought that the Priestess’ words were meant to gain some sort of favor or to deceive her in some manner. And yet… “I do not believe that it is.”

The remainder of their evening passes slowly, Kinvara’s arrival hanging over the two of them like a brewing winter storm. Laira searches through Shiera Seastar’s favored journal, searching for the desperately desired answers that she and Hal are in need of. Hal begins a task of his own, opening a number of the trunks that they had taken from the room that morning and searching through them. There are no true answers to be found with their searching, only more questions.

“We will try again in the morning,” Hal promises, passing a chalice of mulled wine across the back of the couch to his wife. He is more at ease now than he was hours earlier, much of the tension having faded from him.

“There is still much that we have not looked through,” Laira says, sipping her wine as she thumbs through a journal she can only believe once belonged to the Amethyst Empress. The fire within the sitting room of their apartments has been stoked, the flames dancing among the dark stones of the hearth. Mira had brought both she and Hal a tray from the kitchens a number of hours before, though their food remains largely untouched. Above them, the dark rumblings of thunder can be heard as lightning cuts across the sky and a storm begins to bear down upon the island.

“In time,” Hal murmurs, moving to sit with her on their couch. He leans and hooks his hand beneath her ankles where she’s stretched across the couch, lifting her legs to take the spot on the cushions next to her. “There is still the matter of the Priestess as well,” he mutters, settling her legs across his lap.

“I will send her away if you wish it.” Kinvara’s choice of arrival could be reason enough to see her sent back to Essos. She will not allow her to linger if it is going to make her husband more uneasy than he already is.

“Do you believe her intentions for being here are true?” he questions, leaning to steal the chalice from his wife’s hand. He ignores the scolding, yet amused, glare that Laira casts back at him for his theft.

“I believe that she knows far more than she divulged in our earlier conversation.”

“Do you trust her?” he asked, offering her chalice of wine back to her.

Laira is quick to answer such a question, leaning forward to take her wine back. “After all that has happened to us in recent moons, there are few that I trust any longer.”

There is more that she wishes to say, more that lingers upon her tongue. Yet, her words stall as a resounding crack echoes through their apartments and the entirety of Dragonstone seems to quake beneath them. The chalice in Laira’s hand is dropped, shattering where it strikes the floor. Then, there comes a pair of screams from only two doors away from their own, Helen and Sansa screaming out for both she and Hal. Their cries are soon drowned out by another resounding crack and the shuddering of stone.

She and Hal make for the doors of their apartments, tossing them open just as Sansa and Helen come running down the hall towards them. Beyond the walls of Dragonstone, Laira can see the arch of flaming projectiles as they are launched inland from the water. Through the darkness and the rain, she can barely make out the silhouettes of ships out among the waves.

When a sharp streak of lightning brightens the sky, she glimpses the sails of the ships that have descended upon the island under the cover of night.

The green fields.

The golden roses.

The sigil of House Tyrell is unmistakable.

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Both Helaena and Daenerys are familiar with such a custom. They are familiar with such a show of power.

It is one of warning, one that speaks of the death and destruction that shall be dealt to the land of the living should they fail to put the Night King and the Others to heel. The sisters can only be thankful that it is Dark Star that rests upon their sister’s lap, the Valyrian steel blade shining smoke gray in the flickering torchlight.

Had Dark Sister been unsheathed in its place, the world would have already been reduced to nothing more than ash and bone.

It is Daenerys who attempts the first step forward, her intentions pure. For all their differences, Laira is her sister as much as Helaena is. For everything that she knows Laira is meant to do, Daenerys still loves her. And, it has been too long since they have last glimpsed one another in such a manner.

Daenerys steps forward, yet pauses when Vhagar’s head rises, lips curling back so her fearsome teeth are bared to all that are standing before her within the Great Hall. When the dragoness gives a wrothful sounding roar --one of rage and of warning-- the whole of Dragonstone seems to shake from the ferocity of the sound.

Vhagar has long been temperamental. Laira is often much the same, her emotions an ever changing ebb and flow when she is awakened. Never before has Vhagar shown Daenerys or Helaena ill will, though. Yet, Daenerys can feel the ire in the dragoness’ roar. She can feel the animosity brewing hot beneath the dragoness’ surface. Daenerys does not chance another step, does not chance Vhagar unleashing her rage upon them all.

Not even the old magic of the Freehold lingering among Dragonstone’s walls would protect them from the wrath of a fully grown dragoness and her flames.

“The darkness has invaded the Southern kingdoms beyond the Neck,” the Red Priestess speaks, her green eyes glancing to the woman upon the throne at her back. It is Laira alone that she speaks to next. “You know what must be done.”

Helaena can recall such words, can recall them from the last time that Laira was awakened and the world was sentenced to burn and rebirth from the destruction that she dealt. Helaena does not wish for such an outcome this time. She wishes for something more, for a different ending for those that have fought against the darkness and who continue to fight it even then.

“There are still things that we might do,” Helaena reminds, her sapphire gaze flickering from her eldest sister upon Dragonstone’s throne and over to her youngest. Daenerys’ head nods in agreement, her violet eyes pleading as she continues to look up at their sister.

“Please, sister,” Daenerys continues. “Allow us more time. Surely there is a way for us to be victorious without returning the world to ash and ruin.” There is a pleading sort of nature to her words, some desperate sort of look marring her face. “Things do not need to end this way.”

Their sister has always held gentle places for them within her heart. Helaena and Daenerys know it to be true. When they had both been young, nothing more than little maidens gliding about the darkness and the light among the starry kingdoms of their forebearers, Laira had denied them little when they requested it of her. She had smiled more then, been more at ease before the weight of her power and the duty she’d been cursed with had robbed her of the innocence and the happiness she’d possessed.

Daenerys can remember such times, though the specifics of those happier memories are hazy even in her sharp mind. She only hopes that Laira can remember them as well, even if they are but flickering shadows. Daenerys hopes that she can recall the moments of joy among those colored by death and destruction. She hopes, within her sister’s own heart, that some of the maiden Daenerys remembers from her youth still slumbers there, trapped by the weight of responsibility and eager to be free yet again.

“You have failed in your tasks,” the Red Priestess reminds, her voice the picture of calm. There is no anger in her tone nor is there the first hint of remorse. “Death has come because of your failure.”

“There are still people willing to fight.” It’s the Wolf King’s voice that sounds above the howling of the wind and the crashing of the waves. “You can’t sentence everyone to die when we still want to fight for our survival. There are still ways that we might vanquish the Night King.”

“And what do you know of the Night King, Your Grace?”

“Little is known of him except his death,” the Wolf Kind returns. “But, we know enough. The dragons will be enough. So will the armies that we have.”

“Little is known of him? Perhaps to you.” The Red Priestess’ mouth tilts upward with the man’s words, a hint of near amusement flickering in her green eyes. “Should you choose to fight, Your Grace, you shall die alongside all those foolish enough to follow you. The innocents that you fail to protect shall die as well.” So would be the fate of any mortal who chose to stand against the approaching darkness. They would know a suffering like no other, an eternal misery that would take hold of them and never relinquish its hold until the world began anew again.

“Better to die fighting than to be put to the sword like a lamb to slaughter.”

There is a retort blooming upon the Red Priestess’ tongue. It is interrupted by a second voice, one that sounds from behind her.

“Kinvara.”

The dark haired priestess turns at the call of her name, head inclining in respect as she gazes up at the woman seated upon Dragonstone’s great throne. She has ever been a loyal servant of the Lion of Night’s and the Maiden-Made-of-Light’s champion. No matter how many lifetimes came and went, Kinvara remained steadfast in her devotion to her.

“Aōha Dārōñe,” Kinvara returns, the language of the Old Empire flowing as easily from her as the Common Tongue had.

“Lo pōnta jaelagon naejot vīlībagon, ivestragī zirȳ. Se mōris kessa māzigon daor matter skoros gaomis.”

“Hen rhinka, ñuha Dāria,” Kinvara answers, head inclining with the other’s words.

“Lo pōnta qringaomagon se qrinuntys mazēza se Jelmāzmātegor, nyke kessa mōris se vys se manaeragon ziry hen se ñuqir.”

Neither Daenerys nor Helaena requires the Red Priestess to translate their sister’s words. High Valyrian is as much their mother tongues as the Common Tongue is. They know what Laira has said, know what will happen if their enemy steps even a foot within the borders of the Stormlands. They know that the moment the Others break into the Southern Kingdom, Laira will reduce the world to ash to begin it anew.

Such a warning aside, there is a flickering hope that begins to bloom within their chests. They have been granted a rare second chance. It is something that Laira is not known for, something near foreign.

Helaena knows such a chance will not be a lasting one. Their enemy has already made quick work of the Vale and the Riverlands even with Daenerys and her attempting to hold them at bay with Balerion and Meraxes. They will be upon the borders of the Stormlands in a matter of days if they cannot stop them.

“Thank you, sister,” Daenerys murmurs, her voice thick with relief. “Thank you.”

There is no response from their sister. Not when Daenerys and Helaena both dip into gentle bows to her and not when she rises from the throne she has been seated upon since their arrival. Dark Star is sheathed within her scabbard and, then, both Laira and Vhagar vanish in a sudden whirling cascade of shadows, the torches lining the walls snuffing with their disappearance.

~oOo~

Daenerys had known, even granted such a chance to push their enemy back into the wilds of the North, that the endeavor would be a difficult one. They had lost many during her campaign in the North and lost even more among the Riverlands when the Others had overtaken Harrenhal. Still, Daenerys had not anticipated the waves of undead that would await her and Helaena when they departed Dragonstone.

Even high among the storm clouds, Daenerys can see the throngs of undead slipping over the frozen lands. Their eyes are bright blue, shimmering so bright that had Daenerys not known what lay beneath her, she might have mistaken them for stars.

There is no beauty to be found in the bright blue lights, though. There is no beauty in the flames that Meraxes and Balerion set loose upon the world, burning away an enemy that replenishes its losses near tenfold when the flames finally cease.

They had been granted a chance to right their failure. Yet, Daenerys knows they are fighting a battle that has already been lost to them.

~oOo~

“If you would only help us,” Helaena murmurs two days after their arrival upon the island. Her voice is tight, strained in a way that she cannot recall it being since she was a mere child. There are tears welling in the corners of her eyes as she speaks, ones of frustration and fear.

She stands among the grand space of Dragonstone’s library, listening to the wind beat itself against the sides of the fortress. It is here that her sister has been spending much of her time, hidden away from her and from Daenerys and from all of those that had fled with them from Harrenhal.

Helaena knows that Laira’s purpose differs from her own. She knows that it differs from Daenerys’. But, if she would only help them... perhaps they might stand a chance.

“Dark Sister could remain sheathed,” she reminds, desperate to convince her sister... desperate for her to see reason. “You have no need to draw her. Vhagar would be enough. I know it.”

Silence is all that greets her in answer, Laira’s form turned from her and her eyes set upon the dim flames within one of the library’s hearths. Helaena had anticipated such a thing. Laira has not spoken a word directly to her or to Daenerys since their arrival. Helaena knows it is because her mind is already decided. She knows it is because Laira means to release her own army upon the world and to free Dark Sister from her sheath to deal the final blow to the realm of the living.

Helaena knows it to be true, knows that Laira will perform the duty that is expected of her no matter the cost to her or to any other. It saddens Helaena to think of such a thing, saddens her to think of the toll that this will take upon her sister and the end of those that she and Daenerys have been fighting alongside since their own awakenings.

She wishes that there were some other way, some miracle that might allow them to strike the Others from this world while allowing the living to survive. Such wishes are a child’s fantasy, though. 

Helaena takes her leave, slipping away without so much as a parting word. They will be of no use.

Not now.

As she retreats, Helaena never notices Laira’s gaze following her, never notices the flickering amethyst light that swirls within the darkness of the glass candle at her sister’s side or the soft glow of the sapphires and emeralds caught about her neck.

~oOo~

Dragonstone is far too big. It’s too big and the wind howls outside the windows and thunder always seems to rumble through the hallways.

Perhaps, if Uncle Hal had been able to stay with her, things would have been better. Perhaps, Helen would have found something to like about the fortress.

But, Uncle Hal has been gone for days, off trying to fight the things that had taken Winterfell from them. Helen wishes that he was here instead, wishes that the things had never come. She wishes that her parents and her brother were still alive. She wishes that her aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents were still alive too. But, it’s just her and Uncle Hal, Aunt Lyanna, and Sansa now. They’re all that’s left of the Starks.

Helen worries that Uncle Hal may not come back. And, then, it will only be her, Aunt Lyanna, and Sansa. Who will protect them if Uncle Hal is not there anymore? What will happen to them?

Wandering the halls, Helen pauses before a pair of heavy ebony doors. They’re ajar and there is pale light streaming out from between the cracks. Curious, she peeks into the space, surprised at the sight of withered plants and the scent of stale earth and rain.

She pushes into the room without thinking, the smell of the earth and the sight of the plants --even as withered as they are-- reminding her of Winterfell’s Glass Gardens. The ceiling above her is crafted from panes of crystal clear glass and the walls are smooth black stone. She has already decided that she likes the space very much.

So far away from the North, it reminds her of home in the most beautiful –and heart wrenching– way possible.

Helen has only stepped half a dozen paces into the room when she realizes that she is not alone. She pauses in her wandering when she rounds a row of tables, letting out a quick gasp when a tall silhouette comes into view. Helen knows who is there even though she cannot see the person in full. There is only one person left on the island who is that height.

Helen means to turn and leave, afraid that she has wandered somewhere that she shouldn’t be. Her feet get tangled in her skirts when she turns, though, and she finds herself crashing onto the stone floor with a pained cry instead of fleeing. Her hands burn from where they’ve hit and scraped against the stone. Her knees burn too. Helen blinks back tears, scrambling to get back to her feet. She’s stopped by a sudden hand against her shoulder.

Before departing, Uncle Hal had told her to stay away from the Valyrian woman who had remained on the island, had told her that she was not there to help and that she was something dangerous. Helen had not understood what that meant, but Uncle Hal had made her promise. So, Helen had promised him. What would he say if he found out that Helen had accidentally wandered into the same space as her?

“I’m sorry!” she cries, a few tears sliding down her cheeks. Whether they are from the pain in her hands and knees or the sudden twinge of fear in her belly, Helen can’t be sure. “I didn’t...”

She means to say more, means to apologize and beg to be let go if she must. But, a sudden warmth spreads over her palms and her knees. And, then, the pain that had been pulsing in them is gone. Her eyes open. She finds her palms and her knees scrape free. The Valyrian woman is crouched in front of her, a gentle looking smile curling the corners of her mouth. Helen does not think before she stands and bolts from the room, her uncle’s warnings at the forefront of her mind.

The girl has only run a few steps before she pauses, the back of her hand scrubbing over her eyes to wipe away any lingering tears. She looks back at the pair of doors that she has just come through, looks back to see the flickering of a shadow as the Valyrian woman moves about the space. Uncle Hal had said to stay away from the woman, but she had just helped Helen when she didn’t have to.

If the woman was dangerous as Uncle Hal claimed that she was –if she was not there to help them against their enemies– then why had she chosen to help Helen?

Gathering her nerves, she turns back to the doors and tiptoes back to them. Once more, Helen peeks into the room she had just abandoned. She finds the Valyrian woman standing on the opposite side of the space, focus devoted to something atop one of the tables. Quietly, Helen navigates herself between the tables, glancing around a corner when she comes to the end of the last row. If the Valyrian woman notices her this time, she does not allow such a thing to be known.

“Thank you,” Helen whispers into the silence, her voice seeming to echo throughout the room. “Thank you for helping me,” she continues, feeling a little braver when she sees the woman glance over to her. There is no kind smile this time, but Helen can see the gentle look in the woman’s dark amethyst eyes. She does not seem nearly as frightening as Helen had thought she might be. She does not fit the things that Uncle Hal has said about her.  “I’m sorry I ran away from you. That was not kind of me.”

Perhaps the woman was not there to help in the way that Uncle Hal wished that she would. But, she had helped Helen. She had taken away something that was hurting her. There was no reason that she couldn’t be kind in return.

Stepping around the table, Helen carefully makes her way to the woman’s side. Bracing her hands along the edge of the table, Helen looks up at what the woman has been devoting her attention to. There are a number of pots lining the table, the plants within them withered and dead like the others within the room. She recognizes the plants within the pots -- or, recognizes what they were before they died. There had been enough rose bushes of various kinds within Winterfell’s Glass Gardens that Helen could recognize the plants with ease.

“Do you like roses?” Helen asks, looking back up at the woman. This close, Helen can see all of her features from her olive skin to her silver hair and her dark amethyst eyes. She’s very pretty in Helen’s opinion and not frightening in the least. Standing this close, Helen believes that she looks sad in place of frightening. “We have winter roses in the North,” she goes on. “They’re blue instead of red.”

Helen wishes that she could see the winter roses again, wishes that she could go home to Winterfell. Such wishes, she knows, will never come true for her. Not now. Going home would forever be a fantasy.

“My name is Helen,” she tells the woman, watching as she reaches for the stem of one of the plants. “Do you have a name?” she asks. Her question is soon overtaken by an excited gasp, her eyes widening as the rose bush in the woman’s hold begins to strengthen and revive. Helen watches as the stems slowly turn green, leaves beginning to sprout all over the plant. Last, fresh buds begin to take shape, growing until they bloom a bright silvery winter blue.

Helen can’t hold back another excited gasp at the sight of the roses. “Winter roses!” she exclaims, seemingly more amazed by them than by the means in which they had come to be. She smiles up at the woman, her smile only widening when one of the blooms is offered down to her.

“My name is Laira,” the woman tells the young girl.

~oOo~

Helen decides that she likes Laira very much.

She decides that Uncle Hal was wrong, that Laira is there to help them... but in her own way.

Helen finds out quickly that Laira does not speak very often. She is quiet, though she smiles gently as Helen talks with her and answers her questions when she asks them.

It is a fortnight later, when Helen is seated in the library in one of the chairs beside a hearth, that she asks a question that has been on her mind for hours.

“Are you a Princess?” Helen questions. The winter rose that Laira had gifted her the day they had crossed paths within what Helen –now– calls Dragonstone’s Glass Gardens  is still vibrant, shining bright against her mahogany hair in its place behind her ear. “Only Princesses or Queens wear crowns here.”

She asks because, even then, Laira wears a crown, one crafted in glinting silver and shimmering purple amethysts. There is another crown in Laira’s possession as well, one crafted from black Valyrian steel and set with crimson rubies, though Helen has never seen her wear it. She has only glimpsed it among the rooms that Laira keeps, resting atop one of her vanities.

Perhaps crowns were once worn among the Valyrians, though. Perhaps they do not mean the same thing to Laira as they do to those within the Kingdoms of Westeros.

Laira smiles at the question, her voice gentle as she answers. “A Princess to some. A Queen or an Empress to others.” But, to most, nothing more than a Harbinger of Death.

“Uncle Hal is a King,” Helen tells her.

She’s uncertain why she says such a thing and she tries to smile after the fact –tries to be brave– mentioning her uncle. But, she’s worried for him. She’s worried over why he hasn’t returned yet. It has been so long since he left and things only seem to be growing more and more troublesome by the day. The days are getting darker and the storms are becoming worse.

Helen worries he may never return. She has worried about that since he left. But, now, she worries even more.

There is another part of her, one that still dwells in fantasy and fairy tales, that believes Uncle Hal would actually like Laira if he took the chance to know her. Perhaps, if they had met under different circumstances, Uncle Hal could have seen that she was more than what he believed her to be.

Even then, Helen still doesn’t truly know what her uncle believes the Valyrian woman to be. She only knows that Uncle Hal holds no favor for her.

“It seems that Kings and Queens are plentiful on this side of the sea,” Laira murmurs in return.

“Are there many across the sea?” Helen asks, curious. There is a great deal that she knows about Westeros, yet there is more still that she doesn’t know about the kingdoms across the Narrow Sea. They have always been shrouded in mystery, more legend among the people of Westeros.

“There are Kings and Queens the world over,” Laira says, her eyes looking into the flames within the hearth. “Only a fair few are true ones.”

Helen stares over at Laira, taking a moment to think over her words. She knows that for every good King or Queen that there are bad ones as well. There have been bad Northern monarchs just as there have been bad monarchs within the Reach or the Stormlands. She has never truly heard someone admit to such a thing, though.

“I think Uncle Hal is a good King,” Helen murmurs. She thinks he is. Because, Uncle Hal had been given the crown in the midst of the Others howling down from Beyond the Wall. He had been given the Crown after the rest of their family had died and he had never stopped trying to save as many people as he could. “Aunt Lyanna says he held the enemy back from crossing the Neck so that innocent people could flee.”

Wasn’t that what Kings and Queens were supposed to do? Protect those who couldn’t protect themselves? That thought along brings another question to the forefront of Helen’s mind.

“Why won’t you fight like the other Dragonriders?” she asks. There’s no anger in her words, merely curiosity. The other Dragonriders fought with their mounts and their armies. Laira has her own dragoness and, if Aunt Lyanna’s whispers are true, her own army somewhere on the island.

If she has so much to offer, why will she not give it?

“Fighting is not my purpose,” Laira tells the girl. Her answer is gentle, like all the words that she speaks to Helen.

If only it had been. The horrors sweeping across the kingdoms would have long been put to heel had she been born for something more than death and rebirth.

~oOo~

It is only a day later when Helen hears the horns sounding high in the fortress’ towers. She hears the sudden cry of dragonesses high above the island and the clatter of doors being forced open within the Great Hall.

A gust of wind and snow follows those who are returning to the island in from the courtyard, swirling about the dark stone as throngs of men and women slowly trek into the sanctuary of the fortress.

There’s a flurry of movements, ones so disjointed and sudden that Helen can scarcely keep track of the faces that she sees and those that she doesn’t. There are wounded everywhere, being supported by fellow soldiers or carried in on makeshift cots.

Helen is lost among the chaos for mere seconds before she spies Aunt Lyanna, bent over someone that is being carried into the Great Hall on one of the cots. Helen knows before she runs that it is Uncle Hal. She knows that something horrible has happened.

“Uncle Hal!” she yells, trying to get to him.

“Keep her back,” Aunt Lyanna tells someone, her face pale and tears gathered along her lashes. “Don’t let her see…”

Someone tries to scoop her up, but Helen moves, ducking until she can glimpse what Aunt Lyanna is trying to keep her from. All she sees is red blood, staining the cot and Uncle Hal’s clothes and skin and the stone floor underneath him.

He’s hurt and he needs help and there is no one…

Helen stops, snatching away when someone takes her arm. And, then, she runs from the Great Hall, taking to the halls in search of help.

“Laira!” she calls, feet beating wildly against the stone floor as she runs. The library is empty when she comes to it. Helen runs for the Glass Gardens next. “Laira!” she screams, her voice desperate. The doors to the Glass Gardens open just as Helen is about to burst through them, Laira’s form appearing in the doorway only a second later.

Helen hurls herself into the woman’s legs, hands clutching at the silk of her dress. She’s crying now, sobbing as she tugs wildly at the fabric in her hands.

“Uncle Hal is hurt!” she sobs, her face turning up to stare at Laira. Helen sees the same gentle expression that she has seen on the woman’s face since meeting her. There is something else reflected in her eyes, though. Some sort of great sadness that Helen cannot bring herself to wonder about right then. “Please, help him!”

“Helen…”

“Please!” Helen begs, burying her face back into the silks of the woman’s dress. “He’s dying!” Helen knows that he is. She knows by the way that Aunt Lyanna was trying to keep her away. She knows because of all the blood that she saw. “Please, Laira! He can’t die!”

She knows that Laira can take away the pain, that she can heal what’s been done. That’s why she’s here. It’s how she’s meant to help. Helen knows it. She had healed her scraped hands and knees. She could heal Uncle Hal as well.

For a moment, there is a beat of silence so long that Helen fears Laira may say no. She fears that she will say there is nothing that she can do… that the damage has already been done. But, then, a gentle hand presses down onto the top of her head, and Helen pulls her tearstained face away from Laira’s dress to look up at her.

Laira’s voice is soft as she speaks, her smile gentle as she says, “Take me to him.”

Helen doesn’t hesitate. She grabs Laira’s hand and runs with her through the halls until she is tugging her into the Great Hall. There are still throngs of people among the walls, too distracted to notice the young girl tugging the Valyrian woman along with her.

When Aunt Lyanna sees Helen with Laira in tow, she takes an alarmed step away from Uncle Hal. She quickly returns to her senses, though, and attempts to step in front of Uncle Hal to keep Laira away. Helen lets go of Laira and shoves at her aunt’s legs. She’s not strong enough to upset her aunt’s balance, but such a show gains her attention.

“Helen!” Lyanna gasps.

“Laira can help!” Helen tells her, her face red and blotchy from her crying. “She can help! You have to let her!”

There is no rebuttal that Lyanna can offer. There is none that she is given the chance to offer. In the seconds that it takes for Helen to insist the Valyrian woman be allowed to help, she has already knelt at her brother’s side. Only half a heartbeat later, a gentle glow sweeps down from the woman’s open palm and into Hal’s prone form.

The blade wounds slowly disappear, healing and mending. Then, Hal’s chest moves with a sudden gasp of breath. And, he’s breathing again.

Lyanna moves as Laira stands, tossing herself down beside her brother even as Helen throws herself atop her uncle.

The man is disoriented. Laira is able to tell by the look in his eyes. When she offers him a soft smile, he watches her with a look of shock in return.

“Welcome back, Your Grace,” she tells him.

She ignores the tearful gratitude that Helen offers to her, ignores the murmured bits of appreciation that Lyanna Stark gives her as well.

Instead, Laira watches the shifting of shadows along the wall at their backs and shivers when she hears the growling of a horrific lion in her ear.

The Citadel has kept record of the years since the last winter.

It has been some eight thousand years before, a fading cold that had slowly retreated beyond the borders of the North and on towards the Edge of the World. Spring had bloomed with winter’s banishment. And, then, summer had come upon the kingdoms to rule with no opposition. Generations have passed since such a time, the residents of the Sunset Kingdoms knowing nothing but the warmth of summer and all of its bounty.

When the first chill upon the air comes, slipping across the kingdoms like a wave swelling up onto a sandy shore, it is viewed as a curiosity, something near mythical. The clouds begin to gray, then, and the air seems to become colder by the day. When the first flurries of snow begin to dust over the lands, though, the curiosity that had first colored the shift in weather begins to sour to fear.

Those flurries give way to howling blizzards soon enough. Crops and livestock freeze to death out in the fields. As famine sets in, discourse begins to rise among the small folk and the high lords of the kingdoms. Rebellions spark, first within the borders of individual kingdoms and then beyond them.

Six moon turns pass, the bitter cold and the snows from the Far North showing no sign of lessening. At the edge of the Sunset Kingdoms, high upon the Wall, the Black Brothers soon find themselves overrun by an enemy that was long thought dead. The enemy takes them during the black hours of night, unleashing upon them before they even realize they are among them.

The Night’s Watch perishes, lost in a sea of ice and death. The Wall cracks as the last one falls, crashing down in bitter ruin with a thundering so loud that it is heard across the kingdoms all the way to Dorne.

Across the Narrow Sea, among the ruins of the Bay of Dragons, something more echoes the Wall’s destruction. Out of the mists, the thundering of hooves is heard, followed by the crack of leathern wings and the roar of a great beast returned to life.

~oOo~

Even in Dorne, the cold has come. Yet, the snows have yet to fall. The clouds are dark, though, and they threaten to burst at any moment. 

A dragoness, full grown and fearsome, appears in the night upon the shores of the desert kingdom a mere two days after the Wall shatters and falls. There have been no dragons in the world since before the eternal summer, the creatures disappearing as the snows faded away. They have fallen to myth and legend, as much a fairytale as the Valyrian Dragonlords that had once been whispered to have commanded them.

And yet, one of the fabled beasts alights among the fragrant orange trees, glistening pools, and pink marbles halls of the Water Gardens, black as night with burning scarlet eyes and a roar that can be heard all the way to Oldtown.

Upon the sands, Dothraki screamers emerge from the tides, a war cry going up among the thundering of hooves along the shore.

From the black beast’s back, a young woman swings down onto the marbled pathways that meander through the gardens. Her hair is bright in the darkness, silver-gold strands turned near white in the light of the moon overhead, and her eyes bright violet.

Her Dothraki screamers call her Khaleesi, the name shouted as their curved blades clash and sing in time with the dragoness’ roar.

Kivio Darilaros is another name granted to the woman, the moniker whispered from behind the cover of a red lacquered mask by a Shadowbinder from the dark land of Asshai.

“She is the Princess That Was Promised. A champion of R’hllor,” the masked woman whispers to the youngest Viper Prince the evening after the black beast appears among the walls of the Water Gardens, form half hidden among the shadows of the palace. “She shall return the darkness from whence it came and unify these broken lands.”

Khaleesi. Kivio Darilaros. Princess That Was Promised.

The woman responds to them all, though Khaleesi most of all.

As her forces sail north, though, Dothraki screamers and Dornish shields intermingling among the ships that now ferry them towards the approaching darkness, another name is spoken on the wind. The Viper Prince hears it over the waves of the sea and the howling of the wind snapping through the sails of the ships, hears it in answer to his own questioning and curiosity.

“What do you call your dragon, Khaleesi?” the Prince questions late one evening, his voice swept up on the breeze as the hull of their ship rises and falls upon the swelling seas.

“Daenerys,” the woman whispers to him, her eyes and hair shining in the darkness when she turns to look at him. “My name is Daenerys,” she corrects. There is a hint of a smile curling along the edges of her mouth. “Her name,” she begins, violet eyes turning up to where a great shadow soars above them, “is Balerion.”

~oOo~

Their enemy sets in upon them among the barren landscape just south of the Northern seat. Already, Winterfell has been lost. The Northmen are fleeing for White Harbor, for the Neck, for anyplace that can grant them sanctuary from the coming onslaught.

For a time, Daenerys and Balerion prove successful in their campaign. The dead cannot withstand the might of the dragoness and the Dothraki screamers that tear through the enemy’s ranks, the black blades of their Valyrian steel arakhs making quick work of any who stand before them.

The snows and the wind begin to ebb, briefly halts to a blissful silence. But, then, the thundering of battle ranks sounds in the quiet. The wind begins to stir. And, then, it howls. From the darkness, their enemy emerges once again, washing over the ranks of the living like a never ending flood.

Across the Sunset Kingdoms and across the Narrow Sea, there comes another echo. From the depths of the Smoking Sea, there comes the crack of wings upon the air, the resounding clang of spear and shield, and a second roar that seems to rattle the very foundations of the earth.

~oOo~

Harrenhal is a monstrosity of twisted and ruined towers. Ruined or not, its immense size offers those that have fled south from their advancing enemy sanctuary. The winds still howl, cutting about the castle’s towers in a raging tempest.

The howling of the wind and the bitter cold pales in comparison to what awaits Daenerys and all those that have fled south with her within the Great Hall of the castle upon their arrival.

Out among the courtyards, battalions of Unsullied stand in rank, their black armor and shields a stark contrast against the bright snow. Inside the castle, though, lies the most shocking discovery. Curled about the castle’s throne, a second dragoness lies in wait for those that have come to Harrenhal. Silver scaled with molten golden eyes, the beast makes even Harrenhal’s grand Great Hall seem small. The woman who is seated on the castle’s throne seems all the smaller in the dragoness’ great shadow.

It is Daenerys who breaks from the throngs of soldiers and civilians to approach the dragoness. It is Daenerys who opens her arms to the woman upon the throne when she nears her.

“Helaena,” she speaks, smiling for the first time since her journey upon the ship with the Viper Prince as she wraps her sister up in her arms.

~oOo~

There is a Red Priestess named Melisandre among Helaena’s ranks. She’s calls Helaena Elenei, a bridge between the skies and the depths. She is a last defender, one meant to come before the end of times. A champion of the Merling King and the Moon Mother, her ranks differ vastly from those that had risen from the depths with Daenerys.

Daenerys’ Dothraki screamers were a sword. Helaena’s Unsullied were a shield. Two complimentary forces. Two forces meant to hold the line and defend the realm of the living.

“You know what will happen should we fail.”

The words are whispered late one evening, whispered from one sister to another in Harrenhal’s Great Hall. There are others there with them. The Viper Prince that Helaena sees Daenerys sharing scarcely hidden glances with. The Wolf King that had held the dead from crossing the Neck until aid had arrived. The Kraken Queen and the Redwyne King whose ships had ferried civilians down from White Harbor when the city had become overrun with their enemy. The Roses and the Falcon Queen that had given them shields and food when there had been none for them among the ruined Riverlands.

Still, Helaena whispers the words all the same and she watches the haunted look that passes into Daenerys’ violet eyes with them.

“What will happen?” It is the Wolf King’s voice that breaks through the silence that follows Helaena’s words.

“We’ve another sister,” Daenerys answers, never turning her gaze to the man she now speaks to.

“One with a dragon?” the Redwyne King asks. “Call for her, then. Another dragon will be all the better with what we’re facing.”

Helaena shakes her head as the other talks, turning so that she can regard those in the room with her and her sister. Her pale gold hair is darker among the shadows and in the flickering of the firelight, the sapphire blue of her eyes all the deeper.

“Our sister is different,” Helaena tells them, her voice careful. She and Daenerys love their sister dearly, yet she was born with a far different purpose than their own. “She is not a defender. She is a destroyer, a harbinger of death and rebirth.”

The words seem to hang about them like a curtain, the silence that follows tense with trepidation.

“If we cannot stop the Night King and the Others, she will awaken. And, if she does, she will annihilate the world so that it may begin again from the ashes,” Daenerys says.

“The Night King?” It’s the Wolf King’s voice that follows Daenerys’ own. “The Night King is near legend. He’s been in the black earth now for thousands of years.” Little had been spoken of him since his death, not since the Watch took back control of the Wall and cast the Night King and his Corpse Queen from power.

“As have we, Your Grace,” Helaena reminds. “It is no mere happenstance that brought us here. We only awaken when the Night King does. We awaken when the Great Other calls on his own champion.”

~oOo~

Helaena’s Unsullied do as they have always done. They shield the living and hold the line when the dead descend upon them.

Daenerys’ Dothraki screamers do as they have always done, cutting down their enemies at their Khaleesi’s command.

Balerion and Meraxes prove to be the greatest aid. Though Daenerys had made easy work of the dead up among the wilds of the North, having Helaena and Meraxes to aid her and Balerion makes all the difference. It is always different when the two of them are together. There is always an extra bit of power that is lacking when they are separated.

Still, for all their strength and for all their might, the dead overwhelm them in a matter of days. Harrenhal becomes overrun, crumbling under the sheer ferocity of their enemy.

It is when they’re retreating, making for Saltpans along the Bay of Crabs, that Helaena and Daenerys spy their enemy in full. Positioned at the back of the undead ranks, astride their own mounts, they see the Night King’s generals.

Though there is no sign of the Night King himself, the sisters know that he shall not be far behind.

~oOo~

Dragonstone is a fortress that the Valyrian’s crafted eons ago, well protected by old magic and the ancient gods of the Old Empire. It will serve as a safe haven for them as they consider their next plan of action.

Their forces have dwindled so since Daenerys awakened. Still, there is a flickering hope that they may prevail in their campaign. There is still hope that they can save the innocents of this world, that they can beat back the darkness so that this world may heal in place of being subjected to burning.

It takes time for their ships to maneuver through the waters, the seas now filled with ice. As they pass Maidenpool, Helaena spies the glowing blue eyes of their enemy watching them. By the number of them, she doubts there are any survivors among the trading port. Their enemy is only growing stronger.

And they are running out of time.

~oOo~

Among the Doom stricken ruins of Valyria, a final echo sounds. A third snap of leathern wings is heard, louder than any that have come before it. Hooves beat loudly against the earth, sword and shield clattering as a final war cry goes up into the darkness. Last, there comes a roar, one that threatens to shatter the world asunder.

~oOo~

Their ships are passing Wickenden when there comes a snap and a roar so loud it feels as though the world may well be breaking in two. The noise rouses those from below the ship’s deck, drawing them out into the cold just as the sky brightens with a crimson glow. In the distance, a second roar sounds, one so loud it may as well be above them. Balerion and Meraxes answer it, their calls stretching out in the darkness.

“What is that?” the Kraken Queen asks, her hand rising to shield her eyes from the crimson light above them.

The clouds briefly dissipate, revealing the source of light in all its glory. There, high in the sky, is the red comet known as the Dragon’s Tail, the herald of doom and destruction.

“It is the Dragon’s Tail,” Helaena tells them, a chill working its way down her spine as she stares up at the flaming comet. “The herald of Azor Ahai.”

“Azor Ahai?” the Kraken Queen echoes, looking not to Helaena, but to Daenerys instead. There is a look of dread upon the young woman’s face.

“Our sister has awakened.”

~oOo~

Though the seas this far south have yet to form ice as those farther north have, the voyage is a treacherous one in its final stages. Storms have long been fierce when nearing the island of Dragonstone, the lingering effects of the Valyrian magic that had forged the island stronghold.

Helaena and Daenerys suspect something more in the violent storms, though. It echoes with their sister’s presence, in the ire that is no doubt present within her at being woken.

Though the eldest of the three, their sister takes no joy in what gifts she has been blessed with. There is little love for a harbinger of death, even one who allows life to begin again from the ashes. Were their sister given the choice, they know that she would choose to never awaken, to never be forced to deal the final blow that ends all life so that it may start again.

Helaena does not envy her sister’s power, would never wish to possess such a thing. For all the life that her sister is capable of granting, it comes only after experiencing the utter agony of snuffing it out. She loves her sister dearly, loves her as dearly as she loves Daenerys. Yet, she wishes her sister’s power did not haunt her in the manner that Helaena knows that it does. She wishes it did not steal pieces of her sister away each time she is forced to use it.

She wishes the Lion of Night and the Maiden-Made-of-Light had chosen another to shoulder such a burden.

The Dragon’s Tail remains bright in the sky, burning crimson even as the dawn breaks over the horizon in the east. Dragonstone is bathed in the shadow of the Dragonmont as the sisters walk the twisting paths up to the fortress from the docks below, Balerion and Meraxes flying high above the castle. They can only hope that their ships will survive the storm that is raging about the island where they have been anchored out among the depths.

Should they lose them, there will be no escape from the island for those that have travelled with them.

The Stone Drum echoes with the resounding thunder that booms over head. Helaena is the first to notice the lingering scent that surrounds them as the pass into the fortress, is the first to notice the scent of ash, ginger, and orange floating heavily upon the air. Daenerys notices it only a moment after, her hand reaching to touch at Helaena’s wrist as they move for the heavy red doors that will grant them entrance to the Great Hall.

Darkness greets them when the doors are pushed open. For a moment, all that can be heard is the rumbling of thunder above them and the crashing of the sea against the cliffs below them. Then, there comes the low growl of a woken dragoness and a pair of emerald eyes appear among the shadows.

A sudden flash of light fills the room, the torches among the walls lighting one by one until the room was illuminated in the gentle glow of them.

The dragoness lies curled about Dragonstone’s throne, her golden body massive even in the cavernous hall. Vhagar has grown in size since the last time she awakened. She rivals Balerion’s size now. Perhaps, she is even bigger.

A Red Priestess stands at the base of the throne, her hands at her middle and her own eyes watchful of those trudging into the Great Hall.

“Laira.” It is Helaena who speaks first, stepping farther into the Great Hall. Her sister has yet to speak, yet to even move. She sits upon Dragonstone’s throne, sword resting across her lap, eyes ever watchful.

“Laira,” Daenerys echoes. Laira is a stark contrast to her and Helaena. Olive skinned where she and Helaena are fair. Silver haired where she and Helaena are platinum and pale gold. Tall where she and Helaena are smaller. Her eyes differ most, though. They are dark amethyst compared to Daenerys’ own bright violet and Helaena’s sapphire blue.

It takes only a glance to know all that is whirling through their sister’s mind. Both Helaena and Daenerys know there is a war brewing within her that she dare not speak of aloud. They know that she is considering what will have to be done and what that will mean for the realm of the living.

“The darkness has risen,” the Red Priestess at the base of the throne speaks, her dark hair and green eyes shining in the torchlight. “So comes Azor Ahai to make the world anew.”