//------------------------------// // Another Orphan // Story: Those Who Ride // by Mitch H //------------------------------// Sunset awoke suddenly to the sight of great purple eyes, fire-lit and staring at her out of the rich darkness of the khaleesi's tent. Sunset was laying curled in front of the tent's entrance, as she had most nights since the other handmaidens had kicked her out of their shared tent, afraid that she'd catch their bedding on fire with some magical night-time emission. So, instead, she'd taken to sleeping like a guard-dog in front of the khaleesi's own tent, whether it contained a sleeping mistress or not on a given night. Oh, not close enough to catch it on fire if her horn did somehow spark off, but… it was somewhere to be, somewhere people could know where to find her if they needed to find her. The khaleesi was not with her khal, as she was most nights. And as a sleep-grogged Sunset could see, looking into the evidence of the little princess's eyes, she was awake late into the darkness. The unicorn looked up into that darkness and tried to judge the hour through what little sky she could see through the leaf-heavy boughs of the trees that surrounded their fragment of camp. Difficult to say, without the open sky to provide its usual evidence of the wheel of the heavens. "You were burning again, Sunset-horse. A blue like… robin's-eggs, I think? I've never seen a fire that color, nor flame so - soft? Did it hurt?" Sunset tried to not react to news of her horn acting up while she was insensate. Tried not to show how frustrating it was to have something so core to oneself caper and cavort for all the world to watch in fascination, while you yourself was - not. It was like dreaming for the benefit of others. You'll shine for anyone but me, you traitor-self, you. "No, Khaleesi. Horn-glow does not burn to the touch. It can be touch in itself. It is in a way, another limb, or an expression of one. The things your people do with your clever fingers, your finger-tip touches, your fine needle-work - we do that with the horn-glow, the fire you saw. Or to light our way in the darkness. Or, if you are clever, to weave the more subtle effects, layer on layer, and make the magics that move the world." "What were you doing with your fire, that you were burning like that?" "If I only knew, Khaleesi, I would be more useful to you. As you saw, it only burns when I sleep these days. Something about this world, something about me, I don't know. At least it burns when I dream, now. That's something, isn't it?" "What were you dreaming, Sunset-horse?" Sunset fought a sudden jealousy, strangely protective of her dreams. You have taken everything else… But the khaleesi had not taken anything of Sunset's, not her, not the little princess. Those who had taken everything from Sunset had given it to the khaleesi, but the girl wasn't the thief, she was only… The fence? The receiver of stolen goods? No, that doesn't scan, that's a theme for a wretched writer of doggerel, not a true poet. The purple eyes in the darkness watched, waiting, and Sunset blushed, hopefully not so brightly that it could be seen from the rich bedding inside the tent. This, I can give freely. It can be real. "I was dreaming of the forever princess, Khaleesi," Sunset said, quietly into the darkness of the tent. "Nothing more serious than silly night-fancies at first, that she flew into the heavens with a razor to shave the mare in the moon. That she labored in the skies, and pushed the stars into new positions, like a struggling cart-driver with their cart stuck in the mud of a ford-crossing. "Then, I saw the princess in a dark room." The restricted archives, the artifact treasury, the one Sunset had broken into, night after night in those last bitter, acrimonious days before she took the mirror's lure. "She was looking into a great magical mirror, and something… looked back at her." As Sunset's winged self had looked back at her, once upon a time, whispering promises of power and princesshood. "Not the princess, but something, something twisted." The princess on fire, the princess that was fire. "It was as if the princess had combusted, all the power that burned deep behind her eyes - had consumed her, and the physical her had burnt away, wicking this living flame into life. Orange and yellow flaring where her mane had always been a flow like the northern lights, soft pastels replaced by all the eye-straining colors of the furnace. And furious, bitter, mean - nothing like the Celestia I knew. "She said terrible, cruel things to the princess, to herself, that burning reflection of herself. The reflection repeated everything mean or cutting I'd ever said to Princess Celestia. Or - I think? You know how dreams were. Said other terrible things I don't understand, not really." Oh, don't worry, Celestia, they'll do what you always have them do when one of your ponies doesn't do what you want, starts getting ideas. The easiest way to deal with a rebellious pony, isn't it - to lure them into becoming a monster for you? Once they make themselves monstrous for you, well, monsters. Monsters can be dealt with. Disposed of. What tomb will they imprison us within when you become me? Or you could just… follow the angry little filly. See what wonders I actually contain, Princess. Explore, if you dare. "The dream turned bad, and then I got mad. And then - I think I felt you watching me, and I woke up?" "I dream of fire," said the little platinum-blonde girl with the purple eyes. "I dream of it all the time now." Daenerys reached out to the little stand that they used to display her favored gifts from the wedding-feast. On it laid a dragon's egg like ebony chased in crimson lacquer. She took it into her arms, and cuddled it like a doll, or a fitful, sleeping baby. "Fire, and dragons. Viserys tracked me down again today, demanded I talk to my husband about the bride-price. His promised army. 'They will wake the dragon!' He always says that, my brother." Sunset listened to her mistress's distress, her sibling-woe. At least she had a brother to make her life troublesome. "I don't know if Viserys and his yelling made me dream of it, but I did, again. The dragon and the fire. The dragon breathes on me, and it burns away - everything. All my fears and worries. And then I feel like I can be anything at all. And then… and then I can be fierce, and brave. Like you." "Brave! When have I ever been brave in your presence, Khaleesi? I just… go along with things. Do what they expect. Do I look fierce to you? I'm… scared. All the time." "If you are, it never shows. I want that. I want to be fierce." She stroked the dragon's egg, pensive. "I was afraid of my sun-and-stars when we first met, you know? And the wedding… oh, seven hells, the wedding-feast. When he lopped off your magister's head like he was wiping something off his boot. There's nothing quite like watching your bridegroom murder a man at your feet in a fit of pique to really set a precedent for the marriage, you know?" "I may have taken some notice, your highness." "I don't think I fear my husband these days. He's been… kind. Calls me the moon of his life. Who knew such a man could be so romantic? But my brother…" The little princess caressed her dragon's egg, looking troubled. "My brother's been pestering my husband about my bride-price, as if he were a banker, or a merchant to be dunned for an overdue bill. The khas Viserys expects as his right, what he sold me for; I think he thinks the khal will just hand them over like a string of remounts and they'll ride off to conquer King's Landing for him." Bride's-price? Was that like a dower, a bride's settlement in the marriage contract? Sunset was learning more Andalese from her mistress's incidental use of it, embedded in her Dothraki along with the occasional Valyrian relict, than she'd managed to pry in alleged language-lessons from the slippery Ser Jorah. "Ah, well, nothing to do about it tonight. So you dream of home, and your forever princess. What was home like, Sunset-horse?" "I'm not sure I could call Vaes Chetirat home, Khaleesi," Sunset said. When did she start translating even the little things like that? Should she start calling Celestia 'Asavvalame'? "But that was the city I lived in for many years. In Celestia's palace. High on the Canterhorn, a great mountain, in a range of tall, rugged mountains. A city built upon the side of the mountain, where springs pour entire rivers over her cliffs, and the palace hangs over empty air that only a pegasus could love. They say unicorns love heights, but I always liked my hooves firmly placed upon the ground." "It sounds like stories I've read about the Aerie, stories I've been told. Viserys says that it can only be approached by climbing, perilous narrow tracks, from fortress to fortress, into the clouds themselves. It is the holdfast of that traitor Jon Arryn, that man who thought to make a king of the stag-lord, and built the alliance of rebels that stole our lands, drove us out of our home." The khaleesi's brief wonder soured, as she parroted her brother's angry words, and her face folded in worry she dwelled upon that familiar story of betrayal and exile. Sunset could hear the echo of the Beggar King's whining in the khaleesi's sweet voice. "And that sounds like Cloudsdale, Vaes Fas," said Sunset, trying to distract Daenerys from… whatever this was. "If someone had tried to build a road there, instead of taking a chariot like a rational pony. Vaes Fas is a pegasus city, built upon the air itself, cloud and mist and rainbows..." "I'm not sure I believe all I've read about my country, not really," interrupted the khaleesi, not taking up Sunset's offered fancy of cloud-cities and wonder, her brow still heavy with storm-clouds of her own. "I hear Viserys talk about it, and I read about it in the books… I see the words on the page, and it is sworn to be true by those reputable magisters who have written the books that Ser Jorah gave me on my wedding day.  But when I think about it, a city like the Aerie seems unlikely, imaginary, physically impossible. How can a city live so high above the world, fed only through narrow and steep paths a goat would find difficult and inconvenient?" The khaleesi looked up from her dragon's egg. "I've never seen my country, you know." Sunset blinked at this sudden left turn, and tried to follow the khaleesi's lead. "Can a country be yours," Sunset asked, "if you've never been there?" "Oh, Sunset-horse, I've been there! I was born in the Targaryen heartland, you know, on Dragonstone. In the midst of a tempest so terrible they say entire islands washed away… Daenerys Stormborn, birthed in blood. Sometimes I think Viserys hates me because my birth killed my mother." Daenerys stopped speaking at this confession. Sunset was afraid to break that silence, to touch... that. "My brother always says," Daenerys finally continued, breaking her own silences, "that we left Dragonstone not long after the funeral, to look for allies. I don't remember it - I was too young. I have no image of Dragonstone, no memory of it. All I've ever known are these houses, these apartments our supporters loan us here in Essos. Borrowed servants, borrowed fineries, borrowed houses…" Sunset had heard stories about the Beggar King and his little sister, but Daenerys herself had never talked about it before this. Sunset was afraid to speak, and didn't know how to ask without spooking the khaleesi or angering her even further. "You have no-one else other than your brother?" And yet there she was, asking questions again. Perhaps the khaleesi was right about Sunset. "Oh, endless supporters," continued the khaleesi. "Plotters, people happy to plan with Viserys. All left behind in Pentos, or Braavos, or one of the other cities… I've always been the petted-one, the one they smiled and cooed at. Then they would go into other rooms to talk to my brother. But no, everyone else is dead. They killed us all, our loving subjects. The hawk, the lion, the wolf, the stag. Say what you will of the Dothraki, but they seem to like the fact that I'm still alive, and are inclined to keep me that way." Daenerys was winding herself up, and Sunset thought that might be a bad idea. The khaleesi needed her rest, needed to sleep, as much as Sunset did, or more… "You know, we're both orphans, Khaleesi?" Sunset tried once again, as a deflection. "At least you know who your parents were. Me, they found me in a basket on the stoop of the Hoofington town hall one fine morning. I was lucky some timberwolf didn't come out of the Everfree to snap up a free snack before the bailiff found me. Laying there in front of the main doors, exposed to the elements. I'm told he came in early, to open up the court ahead of the circuit judge, and there I was, squalling my outrage against an uncaring world." "But, you said you were the student of a great immortal princess?" "That is what I became, Khaleesi. I have no idea how I began, before that basket. Did my mother throw me away? Were they killed by something, and some relative disposed of the headache by leaving me to the authorities? They say that no unicorn family in the area was missing a foal, or a mare of foaling age. It's possible somepony travelled some distance to get rid of the evidence, far from where my actual parents lived. "But no, it was the orphanage for me. I was just another orphan. Until the princess came on some sort of inspection tour, and I managed to show off at exactly the right time, a real big light show. Impressed her, showed I had potential. Celestia liked to push the idea of meritocracy. I think she loved having a student who came from literally nothing, some nameless bastard with no blood. She never said a word about it, of course, but she loved to march me around at Court, and encouraged me when I mouthed off at the nobles. "It all went to my head, of course. I thought I was being groomed for great things. I could say anything to anypony! But when I look back at it, I wonder if I wasn't just her jester, there to deflate the aristocrats and shame the courtiers. I was too busy with my magic studies, and showing off for the Princess to think about why she let me do the things I did." "Sunset-horse, tell me more of your Vaes Chetirat. They tell me that our capital is a great crimson-walled fortress they call the Red Keep…" Sunset let the little Targaryen, distracted by her own dreams of home, chatter on about that city, that home she'd never seen with her own eyes. The burble faded into a whisper, until Daenerys, her eyes closed upon more private dreams, subsided into a muttering sleep. The little princess slept once more, curled around her dragon's egg. Sunset laid in the entrance to the khaleesi's tent, and watched her mistress's sleeping face in the dying light of the campfires. She looked at her exiled princess, and thought about the drawn and sad and furious dream-face of the princess she'd left behind. Sleep did not come for Sunset before the dawn. When the sun greeted her, she knew she should forget the princess she had thrown away, because it was time to wake the princess that she had been given.