Chapter 8: Exiled?!…

The royals of the cities rode on the backs of turtles, guiding the beasts – that were the size of ships – with magic, where they fought and hunted and rode for leisure. 

Some of the largest turtles were used similarly as boats, with groups of men riding atop the shells. 

The turtle-mounts smashed against each other and the princes duelled, as was tradition. Ceremony and tradition were very important for the Rhoynar.

'That must have be quite the sight to see,' I mused. I had seen many turtles in the Rhoyne. 

Large turtles and small turtles, those with domed shells and flat shells, those that were hard and those that were soft. 

Bonesnappers, brown turtles, green turtles and horned turtles. Those with ridges and those with whorls of gold, jade and cream. 

Using the charcoal from the brazier and some spare parchments I poached from Haldon, I drew a few. 

My hands were usually smudged, as was the sheet, but my drawing skills were improving. Enough to look slightly like a turtle if one squinted their eyes.

When Septa Lemore rose from the river, water beading down her naked form, I averted my eyes once more. It felt wrong of me to look. Septa Lemore, on the other hand, laughed. 

"Oh, Griff. No need to protect my dignity and be modest. The Mother and Father above made us all in their image. Our bodies are their work, crafted by their own hands. Covering your eyes could be seen as disrespectful." There was no chastisement in her voice, it was a gentle teasing.

"I find it disrespectful to look at a naked woman who I'm not close to . . . in a certain way," I said, spitting out the latest bit quickly. 

In many ways, the gang were still strangers, and while I'd seen the others bathe, it felt awkward looking at a naked woman. Especially when I was twelve years old. "I don't think it's proper."

Once more, she laughed and patted herself down with a linen cloth. Yandry looked to be watching her but quickly turned away whenever his wife so much as glanced in his direction. 

"We should bring glory to our bodies. Not hide them."

"Perhaps," I allowed, still not looking. "I would rather the only body I see being the one I married when I'm older."

"What happened to the boy you once were?" she asked, her voice now more curious than playful now. "That doesn't sound like the words of the boy we all know and love."

"He's gone," I said truthfully. I doubted they would believe me as processed by a demon or something. 

I certainly hope not. But I couldn't deny I was a different person that Young Griff had been. "I'm someone else now."

"That is true. I do miss the old you though," she said, pulling her clothes back on and allowing me to look into her direction once more. 

She looked sad. "You were such an energetic boy. Easy to laugh and always smiling. You had such a sweet smile."

"I hope I still have that smile," I grinned, though forcibly, feeling more awkward that anything, "And I do laugh."

"Less so. You're different. You spend less time with Duck and more time with books. More like your father in that regard."

"My father? Do you know him?"

"Only what Griff tells me, which is little, I'm afraid. I can't say I know him, only about him."

'Like most people.' I leaned back, put the bookmark in place and close the thick tome. Then I went over to the side of the ship to have a morning piss.

"Making the mighty Rhoyne even mightier, I see," Rolly called out as he stepped onto deck, yawning and stretching his arms. 

He slept in the hold, nude except for small clothes more often than not. His body was covered with coarse hair and bulged with muscle.

I laughed, glancing back at him. "Making the river slightly deeper."

Ysilla scoffed. "She has no need of your piss, Young Griff. She is the deepest river in the world. The greatest in the world."

"Well, she's slightly deeper now and slightly greater." I emptied my bladder and pulled up my trousers, stretched my back and sighed. 

'The life of an exiled prince,' I mused. 'Pissing in lakes and sailing a boat.' Not what I expected my life would be. But compared to others, it was good enough.

I looked into the water at the face staring back at me. I had never been as diligent in dying my hair as Young Griff had been and it was beginning to show hints of the blond underneath. 

Silver hair, the blood of the dragon. But was I really one though? 

Inside the Shy Maid, they called me Aegon Targaryen, the blood of dragons, the descendent of Aegon the Conqueror and the boy who would return to Westeros and take back what is rightfully mine. 

But it wasn't mine. It was someone else's. I had merely been a college student, nothing more. 

Even the face looking back at me wasn't mine. It was a pretty face, with long eyelashes that made me look half a girl. 

I had stepped into the shoes of another, one I was trying desperately to fill. Would it be enough?

If it was any other story I was sucked into it, it would be no less clear who I was. I would be the obvious protagonist. Lost royal heir, conceived during a comet, with a tragic past – possibly. 

'I'm armed with all the tropes but this isn't most stories.' It wasn't Earth either, though I sometimes forgot it was. If I could be proud for a moment, while I may not know the world, I knew the characters. 

I knew their ambitions, I knew what they wanted. I knew their darkest secrets and wildest fantasies. 

I would use that against them. Not a very honourable thing, sure, but I couldn't afford to be honourable. I had to walk the thin line of pragmatism else I stumble and fall never to rise again.