Holy Steel

NOTE: You can find this story also in Ao3 or Fanfiction . net if you cant read it here. Same title.

***

`Even with my improved memory, learning a new language took a long time,` Doran sighs wearily, after several months he finally got a pretty good understanding of the dead language.

During these months he translated all the mini weirwood runes and his theories were confirmed, and others were born. Which required more research and more study but after half a year Doran finally solved the hundred puzzles surrounding the hidden rooms.

The first is, as he theorized, a secret vault of the First Men. The protective barriers have three objectives: Protect the things inside it against the damage of time, Keep the room hidden, and the most impacting of all; Keep the magic hidden.

Doran discovered that the Andals got their hands on some Ghiscari artifacts that work like compasses, but instead of pointing north they point towards anything or anyone that gives off magical energy. They used these artifacts to destroy magic items and kill any wizard. And there were quite a few mages in old Westeros.

That information led to another question: How could no-mages kill wizards?

Magic made them too powerful to be killed by swords and axes, of course some might have been caught off guard but back then the entire continent knew of the Holy Order of the Seven.

The Holy Order of the Seven was a group of mage hunters, from all the information that Doran found about them those monsters were ruthless, insatiable and very sadistic. The prince found various diaries of survivors of their tortures, and in those diaries he found the answer to his question.

Holy steel, or at least that's what the Andals called it.

It is a very rare metal that has anti magic properties. If a wizard is chained with such metal he cannot use magic, not only that but former prisoners describe the feel of the metal against their skin as red-hot iron.

"I felt as if I had been shackled with red-hot chains, as if they had just been brought out of the forges and were still burning. It hurt, it was a pain like no other. But it left no marks, no scars. It felt like every inch of me body that was touched by the chains burned, I felt the pain and agony, but when the chains stopped touching me body, the pain disappeared and no burn marks remained. It's weird, something out of your worst nightmares. Holy Steel those goatfuckers called it. But there was nothing Holy about it, no divine being would create something so horrible. That metal is the product of the devil, of the fearsome dark God, of the Lion of the North. And those Andals are not men but demons clothed in human skins. Cursed be they and all their descendants. Cursed be they."

The metal was described as a blood-red alloy with blue lines running through it. The Andals learned how to use it in various ways to destroy the magic of Westeros, in shields to protect themselves from spells, in arrows to shoot from afar (for no protective spell can stop an arrow made of Holy Steel), and some even learned how to turn it into powder to poison wizards.

Doran was horrified beyond words.

He had never ever heard of such an abomination.

Nothing remotely like Holy Steel existed on Earth. Sure there were ways to stop someone from using magic but they weren't that abominable. Aurors used handcuffs with runic patterns, those same runic patterns were carved into magical prisons throughout the Wizarding World. They only prevented mages from using their magic to escape or do more damage, they didn't torture them!

Fortunately, the Order of the Holy Seven was officially disbanded several millennia ago, but the prince found no comfort in that. Since he found out about its existence he was very paranoid, he stopped practicing magic in his room and began to study more the magical barriers of the First Men in order to replicate them.

Doran believes that some vestiges of that organization still exist, and he does not want to risk it.

The prince only practices his magic in the protected vault, and with a lot of restlessness and stress.

"Ignorance is bliss. How right was he who said that."

"Is something wrong, my prince?"

Doran is startled and nearly falls out of his chair. He turns his head and sees his cousin Michael.

"Nothing, cousin. I was lost in my mind."

"Well you should find yourself then," Michael Toland jokes, Doran smiles weakly and turns his gaze to the front where Maester Harren is giving his lesson on finances.

The prince half listens to what the old professor said but his mind is still too tormented.

`Witch hunters. And not muggle buffs who are only a threat to other muggles. The real deal. And worst of all, that organization still lives, of that I'm sure. I'm not a Potter anymore but it seems I'll never get rid of that bloody Potter Luck.

A quiet life where the biggest threat is politics? How naive I was, this life is anything but quiet. The politics of this world is a thousand times worse than that of the Wizarding World, it is something more similar to the documentaries I saw about Renaissance and Old Rome. Assassinations, plots, spies, betrayal,... I was already having a hard time getting used to that, I am the heir to one of the biggest players in this crazy dangerous game so I never had the option not to play. But now the dangers are even greater.

Magic is my best hidden Ace but now I have to time every move as carefully as if I were crossing a cliff on a dangling rope. And the craziest thing of all is that instead of being pissed off I'm excited. When did I become an adrenaline junkie?`