46 Chapter 47: Dorne VIII

Mid-Late 157 AC

Arthur Martell had always considered himself a patient man, much like a serpent in the grasses along the Greenblood. He never decided on a course of action without taking the time to ponder the repercussions, especially where his vassals were concerned. Be it troublesome Wyls, opportunistic Yronwoods, or the meddling of Daynes in the houses near them, he took the time to ensure any decision would not threaten the power or position of his family and house. Yet these days, what patience he had was wearing dangerously thin. Long had his family expected war with the dragons, but with their deaths during the Dance, he had assumed the Targaryens would never again grace the shores and sands of Dorne. Oh, how wrong he had been, how complacent his life had allowed him to become, to ignore their enemies to the north until it was too late.

His younger brother and heir, Nymor, had been tasked with rallying their nearest banners while their more distant vassals slowed down the invaders as best they could. His heir even called for an alliance with an Essosi power, but to what end? They had little interest in Westeros outside of trade, and even if they did, a response would be too little and thus too late against the rest of Westeros. Just as well, even if they drove out the Targaryens once more, they could not demand land as compensation, no matter what their lords wished, leaving them victorious, but with nothing gained. Dorne was never one for genuine expansion, being limited to seizing the Marches only during times of great strife in its Westerosi neighbors, or the Stepstones on rare occasions. Even at her fullest might, Dorne's truest weapon was her deserts and hills, her mountains and hidden wells, allowing the children borne of her womb to strike at the enemy and retreat from whence they came, again and again, until the foe was dead or driven back. Holding any new lands would be impossible.

The reports trickled in like sand through cracks during a windstorm, small, but noticeable, and growing as time pressed on. Along the western shores, reports of Ironborn reavers attacking coastal villages and manors coincided with the arrival of an army on the very shores of the Torrentine bearing Westermen banners. The Daynes had written they were leading a coalition against this, but the longer it took to muster, the more this enemy army fortified itself along those shores. Another enemy army marching through Prince's Pass was bringing with it great columns of barrel-laden carts, refilling their water from whatever wells they seized, and the lords of the region had gathered near Skyreach, hoping to contain and drive them back. Only in their darkest hours would a Dornishman consider poisoning a well to deny an enemy, and though their foe was ponderous, they moved steadily, as an unrelenting wave.

Whatever foreign ships that reached Dornish ports remarked of the great number of vessels gathering near Kings Landing, a vast armada bearing all manner of colors from every eastern lord the Targaryens yet held sway over. Such a force would break any meager defense his vassals could mount on the sea, and would no doubt seek to strike at any undefended town or keep, perhaps even threatening Sunspear itself.

The fourth force, and the one that gave Arthur the greatest dread, was set to march upon their eastern shores. Castle Wyl held them at bay for now, courtesy of the young Lady Ashara Wyl rallying its defenders, but for how long she would hold was anyone's guess. With no fleet to stop them, this army needed neither caravans or secured roads, for every port or keep they seized along the coast could be supplied by the very armada forming above the Stormlands. All reports indicated the dragon king himself, that vainglorious boy, was leading the army with his princely brother, along with nearly the entirety of the Stormlands and Crownlands, with a few damnable Reach lords thrown into the mix.

The House of Black and White was well beyond his reach at this point, but plenty of Dornishmen would be willing and able to try for the sake of Dorne's freedom. The death of one or both may even cause strife between the dragons and end their war before it grew worse. Reaching for his quill, Arthur was interrupted by his maester arriving, a raven still perched in his hands, as well as his only living child following close behind.

"My prince," he said, holding out the message. "From Castle Wyl."

Accepting the missive, Arthur hoped the news would be of benefit to Dorne, if not good news. Perhaps the enemy had begun to suffer from some sort of plague? Concentrating too many men around limited water was a recipe for illness to sweep through the ranks, and Stormlanders made horrible latrines. Yet halfway into the note, a cold weight, entirely at odds with the heat of the day, settled in the pit of his gut.

"Maester, leave us," he said.

Without a word, the aged Dornishman left, leaving only his bastard Lewyn by his side.

"Sit," Arthur said, and the young man did so. "How is your eye, son?"

"The heat makes the hole itch whenever it dries out too much," he replied, briefly lifting his patch, revealing only a scarred maw in place of an eye. Some might think the patch made him look dashing, but all Arthur saw was the price paid by the folly of youth. Lewyn himself was one such folly, a night of consolation with a pretty tavern wench after Arthur's lady wife had died in childbirth, along with their infant daughter.

"Your studies?"

"The maester says I have a knack for architecture despite my… impediment, and claims I'll do well with whatever farmland I am tasked to."

"Good, that's good, it will help you build a life for yourself once we find you a good wife and lands for your own. I was thinking somewhere near where the Scourge and Vaith join to become the Greenblood, perhaps near Godsgrace. You've earned the right to at least a knighthood, no Dornishman can deny that."

Their chatter fell by the wayside, silence taking its place. He had always loved his son, but never wanted to name him a Martell. His vassals would not accept a legitimized bastard who had no connection to another noble house, not with trouble having made its way to their lands. Had Lewyn returned whole and with prestige to his name from his time raiding, in a time of long peace, perhaps his vassals might have been considerate to the idea, what with Nymor's children being so young yet. Now though, with his injuries, the tales of what happens to raiders, and the war itself… finding Lewyn a nice place to settle down, away from Nymor's family, would be the best he could do for the young man, to keep either of them safe from the vultures lurking about.

"My prince…

"When we are alone, son, I am more than your prince."

With an abashed nod, Lewyn looked to the missive, still clutched in Arthur's hand. "What has happened… father?"

"The worst, I fear," Arthur replied. "Castle Wyl has fallen to the dragons and their army."

He had expected that keep to fall, even with its hidden reserves of supplies and carved caverns, but so soon after being sieged? He had expected weeks, mayhaps even a month or two of time before that would occur. Had that counter invasion of the Stormlands really depleted their manpower so much that a decent defense had been rendered impossible?

"Damn the Wyls, damn them all," his son muttered, rubbing his face. "They raid and cry foul when the bill comes due for such actions, and then surrender without a fight once they no longer have the advantage of terrain or numbers. Cowards, the lot of-,"

"There's more," Arthur said. "The acting lady of House Wyl, young Ashara, is dead."

"What? She was only a child!"

"Old enough to try and stab an invader and receive a cracked skull for it. The missive mentions she died of a fever the day it was written."

"Who wrote to us? The invaders?"

"Aye, and judging from the lettering, my guess is the young king himself dictated what the maester was to write," Arthur said with a sigh. "With Ashara's death, House Wyl is no more. With the destruction of our advance army in the Stormlands, and now Ashara's death, there are no living Wyls to speak of."

"What of their vassals? Surely there are Wyls by blood amongst them?"

"Nay, my son. The Wyls have long sought alliances with neighboring major lords through marrying off their daughters. Only their sons took wives from the daughters of their vassals, as rare as that was, and all thus bore the name Wyl. I fear word of this will spread to the rest of Dorne sooner than later, as the invaders no doubt sent ravens to more than just Sunspear."

"Are there other claimants to worry about?"

"None that come to mind, but I will need to consult the maester on the lineages. If there are, they will assume the Wyl name, but if not… a new house will have to arise in its place, either from amongst the more powerful of their former vassals, or of a house raised from elsewhere."

He dared not say it to his son, but that could be an answer to his son's future. Not as a Martell, but a new lord of his own choosing. Only time would tell if it would be possible to give his son this gift.

"So, what is to happen now?" Lewyn Sand asked.

"There is no mention of it in the missive, but I have no doubt the dragons march towards us once more. Yronwood is the greatest house between Sunspear and Wyl, and it with them that we shall have to try and stop this eastern invasion at the Gates of Dorne. If not, then should they stick to the coast, House Jordayne of House Tor will be the next. Yet I suspect they will instead march towards the Greenblood, and with little worry for fresh water…"

"They will march to Sunspear," his bastard replied. "Do we know the lords among them?"

"The dragon brothers, Daeron and the one they call the 'Fyrestorm'. The current Baratheon leads the Stormlands, and the Tagraryens have assembled their Crownlands and a few Reacher lords. A greater army than we can defeat in pitched battle, but if we can delay their advance long enough, then perhaps we can see to their retreat. Summer may no longer be upon us, but the desert is still a dangerous place to those who know little of her ways."

"What of House Wytch?"

Arthur did not miss the fearful expression on his bastard's face. "No reports mention the house that took your eye, my son. That is not to say he may not be among them. You shall not be among the men anyway."

"I see," Lewyn sighed. "Thank you, father."

The day dawned as most did this time of year, with a smattering of nighttime clouds dispersing as the sun rose and the sea winds drove them off. Her long hair twirled into seven braids by her eldest maid, Allyria Jordayne sat upon one of the Tor's upper daises, gazing westward as her ladies in waiting idly gossiped over a small breakfast. Since her father's departure to put a stop to the invading Targaryens, she sat there every day her duties allowed, awaiting his safe return.

Oh, how wonderful her father and his men had looked in Dorne's winter sun. Burnished copper inlaid upon their steel coats of mail, draped with silver cloaks and red gold scarfs to repel the heat of the sun. Those not on sand steeds bore round shields of copper-rimmed steel, emblazoned with the great quill of House Jordayne, and those not bearing long spears sported their Dornish bows of yew, an expensive but necessary import from the Yronwoods. The gathering of their vassals and levies had taken longer than her father wished, but as Castle Wyl held the invaders to one region, they managed to march out as a unified force as word of the extinction of House Wyl reached them.

Alfrid was dead, then. A dead Sand was no different from any other dead Dornishman, likely burnt to ash by the Fyrestorm himself. Or had he fallen afoul of the Wytch one final time and been left impaled for all to see? Once, not so long ago, Allyria might have been sad for the man who so desperately wished for her hand over Trebor Dayne. Now, after hearing from Lewyn on his return to Sunspear, of the horrors her suitor had propagated, and the rumors trickling out of the Stormlands of what Alfrid's Dornish host had inflicted upon the smallfolk of those lands…

It made some part of her wretch in disgust. Long had her father warned her of the man's tendencies, as a Wyl, to hold a cruel streak, but he'd still allowed them to write. The fault lay on him that Alfrid had been a potential suitor, upon earning the Wyl name. Now though, with time to think and news to spread, even if half the rumors were blatant lies, that meant the other half were not. Butchering entire villages? Poisoning wells, something any true Dornishman would be loath to do? That was not raiding, nor even true war, as her father called it, but senseless slaughter and destruction. Raids were to deny an enemy, bloody young men, mayhap even make off with useful plunder. She had looked into ancient ledgers the maester kept as best preserved as possible, and there was little mention of anything like what Alfrid had done.

Even burning the granaries in their wake would have been more of a detriment to the Targaryens than killing everyone in their path. Men, she had been told, could accept such smaller slights if they were not directed at them. For the perceived slight of slaughtering your subjects and fellows, no lord could stand for that who wished to remain lord. It had served as a rallying cry, no doubt, and sparked the fires of hatred and determination no sand or heat could now stamp out. It was no wonder there were no survivors once the gods showed their displeasure in the form of the Wytch and the Fyrestorm.

"The Gates of Dorne are hard to breach," one of her handmaids said, interrupting her line of thought. Turning, she found them seemingly unconcerned, lounging in the wicker chairs the servants had produced for them. Though they showed her proper deference when needed, here, away from their families and responsibilities, they could be the friends they had all become.

"Iris," another, Oryana of House Highlook, replied. "they said the same of the Boneway, and of Castle Wyl. Both have been taken by the invaders and likely garrisoned with too many men to dislodge."

"Poor young Ashara, to have been lady of a house for only a short time, and to be remembered as the last Wyl before an untimely death," Myriah of House Proudwood said. "They claim it was a fever from an injury, but knowing those beasts of the Stormlands, it was likely something far worse that ended her."

"Always the macabre, aren't you, Myriah?" Iris of House Augery interjected. "The dragon king may be young, but rumor has it his younger brother was a pious prince before the war. Surely such a boy would not allow for wanton slaughter?"

"The Fyrestorm, not allow wanton slaughter?" Myriah replied. "Surely you can't be serious. He destroyed hundreds of Dornishmen with fire and fury not seen since the last of the dragons perished in their Dance."

"Not to mention there is rumor of him knowing the Wytch," Oryana said with a shudder.

The Wytch. The Fyrestorm. Even more than the young dragon king, these two names had begun to grace the lips of every smallfolk in Dorne, and despite the efforts of some, even those of worrying nobles. Many had seen the eyeless wretches sent back to Dorne or heard secondhand stories from those who had spoken with them, and the tales of their exploits and appearances alike seemed to change with every passing moon.

"Half the Stormlands probably know of that lord by now," Iris added. "A dreadful creature, I've heard. Valyrian eyes like the Targaryens, but the coloring of a Baratheon. Big cruel brute too, no doubt, like the rest of them."

"I've heard he is a giant of a man, at least a head above the rest. Eyes so terrible that he had taken those of his enemies, so that they might be the last thing they saw," Oryana said. "Curious how similar his house words are to those of House Vaith, his family was likely too stupid to think of anything clever and just mimicked a superior house's words."

Allyria decided to step in. "Yes, they are similar, but his words ring true, it seems. Wind and rain heeded his call against his foes, they said, blessed by the Seven themselves for his construction of a great Stormlands sept."

"Pah!" Myriah said. "A great sept, in the Stormlands? Those brutes may claim to pay heed to the Seven, but this sept is likely nothing more than an oversized and windswept cottage, like the rest of their hovels."

"I would not be so sure of that," Allyria replied. "Septon Davos made a pilgrimage a little over a year ago to see the sept for himself and said it was quite impressive for the Stormlands. He also returned with strange and wonderfully scented soaps that did not roughen the skin as much as others."

"That is where he got those? I thought they were from Kings Landing, not the Stormlands," Iris said. "So they finally manage to contribute something other than mutton and terrible history with their neighbors."

"Given how readily the entire Stormlands responded to Alfrid's incursion, I'd say the Wytch has made more than a few friends," Myriah said, before looking to her friend. "My apologies, Allyria, I didn't mean-,"

"It is fine, Myriah," Allyria replied. "Even though my father has allowed you to be my handmaidens, we are still friends, are we not? So long as it is not said with ill intent or for unfair reasons, it matters little. Besides," she added, sipping her flask of watered wine, "perhaps it is the will of the Seven that Alfrid and I were not meant to be. Clearly, they did not favor such a match by denying him the Wyl name, and then sought retribution for his actions against smallfolk."

"But they were actions against our enemy, those that would seek to conquer and repress us," Iris said.

"Perhaps, but not at the expense of the innocent. Raids will always have deaths, but as the Wyls did? I cannot accept that any just cause should be so tainted by such horrendous deeds. Besides, despite the fury no doubt burning within, we've no word if our fellow Dornish have suffered under the yoke of their conquerors."

"New masters, more like," Oryana muttered. "Slaves, they all are, to the Targaryens and that Iron Throne. We Dornish are free, and mark my words, we will stay free, even if we have to drive out each and every single Targaryen levy and lord they send our way."

"That is why I pray father is successful with the Yronwoods at the Dornish Gates," Allyria said. "All of our fathers have gone off to war, save for yours, Iris, but Lord Augery is yet sick, is he not?"

"Yes my lady, his consumption comes and goes in severity depending on the time of year," her handmaid replied. "I pray he has years yet left, I doubt Oberyn is ready to become Lord Augery."

"Whatever the case my be, the Dornish Gates will hold back these invaders and result in their flight back from whence they came," Oryana said. "With luck, they may even capture the dragon king or the Fyrestorm, and thus force a truce."

Time erodes all things. Long lineages of people, their cultures, their ideals, their names, all these and more slowly drift away, taken by the river of time. A cultural memory lasts perhaps the longest, for there are no stones tablets to break, no parchment to shred, and no books to burn. It is a history carved into the very mindset of a people, one that is remembered through tradition, oral tales of greatness and darkness, and never truly forgotten, merely changing form as the eons progress.

Yet this is not a perfect means. All tales are told from the perspective of those who are listening, and in time, divergences through prejudice or forgetfulness can warp what was once truth into mere speculation. Was the Last Hero a Stark? The Night's King a Bolton? Or were they reversed? Did dragons truly roam the world, or will they one day be remembered as simply allegories, or devices called as such for their destructive power? What of magic, and the abilities it granted to those who learned of its myriad ways? Something truly fantastical, or interpretations of technologies the teeming masses did not truly understand?

No land is subject to forgetting the past than those who take little care to remember it. Or worse, are made to forget, by powers beyond the scope of mere men.

Deep in Dorne, there have always been the caverns to which people fled to escape persecution. In the ages gone by, when the Hammer of the Waters broke the Arm of Dorne into the Stepstones, people fled into the caves to escape the ensuing storms created by such a violent upheaval. When flocks of monstrous beasts took to the skies eons before, many a village retreated with their livestock to sheltered alcoves and deep basins, in which they might dwell until the danger had passed and their homes could be reclaimed once again. In war, to defend against a much larger foe, a small entrance to a great cavern was more defensible than an open field, and into these natural shelters soldier and smallfolk alike fled many times.

In more recent years, with the coming of dragons to the shores of Dorne, a great many smallfolk fled the fire and ruin, as they had done for generations. Deep into these caverns they once again fled, building upon the traditions of their ancestors, those First Men who had driven away the creatures and not-men that had dwelt in those lands before their arrival. Deep in the Undersand, wherein all waters flowed through to every well in Dorne, they would spend as long as they could in those sheltered caverns, feeding off the groves of mushrooms their ancestors had first cultivated to survive upon in times of great upheaval. Goats were taken to forage at whatever grew near the cave mouths and around whatever shafts of light penetrated the depths long enough for plants to grow. Pigs were fed mushrooms and whatever else could be found, but in many hard years, when the trouble would not pass in a short enough time, all livestock would be slaughtered before the people would return to the surface.

Some never again left the great caverns. Through the collapsing of caves or their number becoming lost, many people had found themselves trapped deep underground, never again seeing the sun. With some pigs being the only livestock able to survive, it fell to mushrooms, blind fish in the rivers, and countless cave crickets to feed many isolated villages in the deep dark. Only the soft glow of the waters, that mysterious milky color, allowed them to see beyond the borders of their stone domiciles.

Yet in this deep connection of caves and caverns, of winding underground rivers and seeping springs, of sheer walls and great jagged ceilings, there lay the great center of it all. The place from which all water in Dorne sprung forth, a permanent stain upon the land of Dorne from the effects of the Hammer of the Waters.

Darkwell.

It was here that they first learned of their god, the one that would protect them from the dangers above… for a price.

Upon the shores of Darkwell sat Darkwell, as the village was known, the greatest in the Undersand. Over countless centuries more and more had been brought down here by those escaping strife up above, being it tools, supplies, or relics by which to leave behind for safekeeping. Yet the last of the refugees had found themselves trapped by a rockslide, the cave leading from their great keep above sealing itself with stones far too large to dislodge, and far too many to remove. Some claimed it a resort by their god to keep them safe, others it was the wrath of their foes at their escape from above.

That was the tales of the elders, anyway. Perros had known only the soft glow of the waters and the dark. He had heard tales of being able to see for great distances, of landscapes with no ceilings, and of animals he could not believe existed. Not even his dreams, of great wings and soaring over countless colors of different lands, could be explained to others without receiving scorn and ridicule. Who was he to see in his dreams what not even the grandfathers of the eldest elder had seen in their youth?

When he asked his elders about vultures, he was beaten, the elders claiming them to be servants of their god's greatest foe. When he told others of a great roost above them, he was beaten, being told it was the home of that which their god kept them safe from. When he spoke of his dreams of them leaving to the surface under the guiding light of a dark storm and a small scaly beast, he was beaten, being told it was nonsense at best. It did not take long for him to stop speaking of his dreams, keeping them to himself. Not even his parents knew of his dreams, of his visions of above, for this was their life, and for them to know was to put them in danger from others.

Not that any of it mattered anymore. He had been chosen this year to be the sacrifice. A great honor, the elders told him, that he should be given to their great god in the darkness. It would keep them all safe, they said, and earn them a respite from the raids of other villages until the next sacrifice was chosen. Some villages no longer traded with them, they said, their number having grown too few to sustain, and thus had either sacrificed themselves for a sustained peace, or split to join with whatever other villages would accept them.

For him, Perros suspected it was not only for his dreams, that which threatened the power of the elders, but from the frailty of his body. His father and mother had been cousins, ones that refused to marry outside the village to attain some measure of truce, and he had been born with weak bones and weaker muscles. In these lands, if you could not fight, nor harvest the mushrooms, or wrangle the swine, then you were of no good to anyone. Yet it was his mother's love that shielded him all his life from disdain and hate, and his father's guidance that sought him to try and put himself to the use of the village. He tried his hardest to help, from collecting bat guano for the mushroom fields to harvesting as many cave crickets as he could catch for supper.

No more. With his mother's death at the hands of a rival village during a raid for hogs, he had lost that protection. His father had been a sacrifice some years before after breaking his back falling from harvesting bats, and now it was his turn to join his family in the afterlife promised to them by their god.

Unbound, accepting of his fate to sate the hunger of their deep protector, he stood upon the platform many others had before him. Around him lay the treasures offered to their divine protector, countless relics and loot from others who had come before them. Great piles of strange coins, weapons from across the sea, the prow of a ship that bore the ancestral letters of distant Rhoyne, and many others. Some had been brought eons ago, others more recently, and more than a few were offerings taken from other villages during raids years before.

In silence he stood as a great gong was sounded in the deep, rung by the eldest of the elders. None ventured near him, hanging far back from the platform, lest they be selected by their god instead. All feared it, never saying its name lest they draw its attention. Instead, with fingers parted, they made its symbol followed by a harsh chomp of their teeth.

The slowly flowing waters stirred as great concentrations of white foam rose to the surface. This close to the river, all Perros could see was the shine of the water, and the variety of mushrooms that grew along its banks. Blind fish leapt from the water haphazardly as a swell approached the shore, some carelessly beaching themselves in the process.

This was it. He would be with his parents soon, and together, they would soar out from this darkness, and into the light they had never seen.

From the water a great claw emerged, jagged and terrible, sitting upon an armored stump of a leg that did not look natural. With swiftness belying its size, he was seized, and the sharp pain across his abdomen was fleeting before he was suddenly dragged into the water. Underneath, the glow was greater, but amongst the glow was a great gaping maw, with edges sharper than the blades of their tools. The darkness loomed as he was shoved into this darkness, and with a swift crunch, Perros felt no more.