Chapter 3-Duty Calls!

Chapter 3

JEYNE ARRYN

The Eyrie was a thing of marvel, a fort that touched the skies with its peaks touching the clouds. It was a seat worthy of House Arryn, whose banner flew the mighty falcon. Built by Roland Arryn so that the prestige of his seat may match that of Casterly Rock and the seat of House Hightower in Old Town, he had begun the construction of this might seat.

Carved into the peak of the tallest mountain, it was not the largest castle, yet it was an easily defensible one, with only ever the dragon having felled it when Visenya strode in its Halls on the mighty Vhagar.

In one of the castle's towers, the sheets lay dishevelled in the room reserved for the lord of the castle. These days, Lady Jeyne Arryn occupies this room, where she is often accompanied by her beloved companion, Lady Jessamyn Redfort.

And as the Sun erupted out of the shadows, its rays hit the two women that lay under silken sheets as the blue-eyed Jeyne sifted through the fiery hair of her 'dear companion,'

"Such somber mood so early in the morning?" Lady Jeyne teased, her blue eyes burning with a fiery passion that would put her companion's red hair to shame.

Jessamyn, her dear companion, did not deny her pensiveness as she raised her head and looked her in the face.

"Are you not concerned?" Jessamyn questioned, and Jeyne was taken aback by the question.

"About what?" she asked, too lost in those fiery locks and spotted freckles to see the frown marrying her features.

"About the King and how he forcefully has called back Aegon?" She realized her friend's worries and what a worry it was to have.

"Why should I be worried?" she answered gently. She let her hand waft through her soft hair, and the Sun erupted and illuminated their room with its gentle light.

"The King could be planning something. He has never shown much interest in Aegon to this day, yet now, with the Queen pregnant once more, he calls for him to come to the capital, just as his heir is set to be born," Jessamyn ordered, and Jeyne was too lazy to fish for political plots so early in the morning.

"And why should that worry me?" she asked again and Jessamyn pushed her hand away as she pushed herself up, taking much of the sheets with her as snuggled up beside her.

"Because this could very well be a plot, and Aegon might be at the center of it. Maybe he..." her friend halted at that, and a pang of jealousy bubbled up inside her.

"You seem rather concerned, Aegon?" she teased as she saw Jessamyn flush slightly.

"Should I be jealous, my dear?" she continued teasingly as she bit into her ear, growing joyous as she felt a flush creep up her porcelain neck.

"No, but I thought you would be more concerned about that, you know. Because of his growing influence. Because already many in the Vale look to him to rule, and if he gains the King's favor on top of that or a dragon, he could try and replace..."

And she finally caught onto the reason for her dear Jessamyn's worries and chuckled at that.

"Aegon will never try to replace me," she answered lightly, thinking of such a notion to be a bad joke.

Aegon Targaryen, her distant cousin and playmate of years. He was the son of Prince Daemon and Lady Rhea, a child born out of an icy union, scorned by his father for his features that lacked the prominent silvery blonde hair of the Targaryen lineage. He had come to the Eyrie with Lord Yorbert when he was to act as his reagent. They had grown up together in these Halls, like brother and sister, with her often trying to catch up with the enigma.

"What if it isn't replacing you? He could try and force you to marry him?" Jessamyn added, her words sent her cackling.

"And what would be so bad about that?" she teased Jessamyn, she was to marry someday no matter her preference and, she would much prefer it to be Aegon, a person she could trust implicitly.

Yet alas, such a thing was not quite possible.

Jessamyn's eyes widened as she tried to move away from her.

"Don't be so cross, my dear?" she explained as she held her hand.

"I had hoped that by now you must have learned that I only hold you in my heart," she added, yet that did little to appease her dear redhead, who huffed.

"Yet you speak so casually of marrying someone else, of marrying someone who covets your position. Otherwise, why would he still hold onto the powers of his grandfather even when you have come of age," Jessamyn complained, and she did not know she thought as such. She knew of such rumors and gossip circulating around the castle yet ignored Aegon's insistence, for he did not mind it, unlike her.

"Why do you say that?" she asked sharply. Her tone must have shown her anger as Jessamyn's face fell, and the redhead bit her lip, her eyes downcast as she answered.

"Everyone says it. They believe that the Prince covets power and is using his grandfather's past position to cling to more and more power," she replied, and she considered such words as an insult both to herself and towards Aegon and thought that perhaps it was time that she curbed such gossip.

"And you think so as well," she asked, seeing Jessamyn shrug.

"It has been quite some time since you came of age, yet the Prince still counsels you often and oversees many things," and he did, yet at her command.

She should have gotten angry at her; maybe a few nights away from her would have done, yet the more she stared at that sullen face, the more her resolve to punish her dear redhead grew weaker until she gave up on the idea.

"You do not know the truth, my dear," she replied as she held her hand.

"Aegon indeed wields much power, yet he does so at my bidding," she clarified, though in truth, she might have to add 'begging' to that to make it the whole truth.

"Why?" Jessamyn questioned.

"Because he is the most able and brilliant mind I have ever known. All the changes and progress that you see in the Vale over the years is all because of him," and the change was visible now.

It had begun with small things: improved farming, better administration of laws, and many other small projects that seemed quizzical at a simple glance. Yet now, years later, Vale had begun to shed the image of the once destitute and hunger-ridden land it once was.

It was all because of him. And now, even as they both sat comfortably in their room on their soft bed, he fought on for them. For her, as he tried to rid these lands of the blight of the savage Mountain clansmen, a feat no lord of the Vale had been able to accomplish in over a hundred years.

"And if Aegon had his way, my dear, he would be halfway across the world by now," yet few knew that.

"What?" Jessamyn questioned.

"Indeed, so do not doubt him. He is a better person than the rumors and the gossip make him out to be," she assured her, recalling how little the two had interacted with each other and how maybe such a thing was by her own design.

There were many rumors and gossip around him, the most vocal being his infamy for cruelty, even though few tried to recall the reason why they called him such.

The Bloody Prince.

KNOCK. KNOCK.

There was a knock on the doors, and she saw Jessamyn tense up as she would, their late-night tourist so visible to anyone who would step in. Yet none of her guards would dare to; they were well trained enough, and even if they did and tried to make something of that knowledge, she would simply sick her little dragon onto them.

"Who is it?" she asked with calm and poise even as Jessamyn jumped out of her bed, her hair flowing down as she raced towards her dress.

"My lady, a missive has arrived from Prince Aegon," and she perked up at that. Aegon's campaign against the mountain clansmen was nearing its end.

"Leave it outside and go," she commanded.

"As you wish, my lady," and if the man suspected anything, he made no mention of it as Jessamyn wore her gown, making her shake her head. She heard the acolytes footsteps going down the steps, the guards were stationed at the end of the stairs.

She pulled together the sheets as she strode off the bed and walked up to the door, before opening it and taking the letter, her curiosity enough that she ignored the decorum even as Jessamyn wailed behind her.

She ignored her fiery companion as she tore into the missive and let her eyes skim over its contents.

"Aegon has won," she announced excitedly as Jessamyn became quiet.

"He has conquered the Mountain clansmen."

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AEGON TARGARYEN

Blood had long become an intimate friend to him, as he had expected it to. Yet despite him becoming friends with it, he tried not to make a habit of being drenched in it as he was once again.

He could feel it seeping into his skin even through the doublet that he wore underneath the armor. His hair was soaked in it as well, as the men rounded up what remained of their enemies.

He saw half a dozen bringing forward a chained man, one he recognized as the leader of one of the clans they had just destroyed on the battlefield. Ever since he had realized the time and place of his birth, he had realized that blood and gore would be in his destiny no matter how he tried to run away from them, and loathed as he was to admit it, the blood that ran through his veins belonged to two people well versed in the art of spilling blood.

His father, the Rogue Prince, was a famous warrior, who, according to many, had no equal in the realm, and his mother, Rhea Royce, came from a line of warriors, and though she was handy with a blade, her true strength lay with the bow and arrow. In all of Vale, there was no better hunter with the bow than her.

And his heritage showed itself. Aided by a penchant for paying attention, an appropriate diet, and exercise, he had blossomed as a warrior beyond his years. And even as a squire had been able to toe and toe with many a knight. And he would be thankful for all his dedication when Arnold Arryn would try to usurp his cousin Jeyne as the ruler of Vale and try to kill her.

Now that he remembered, it had been the first time he had been covered in blood.

"You cur. You honorless bastard!" Thorin Moll, the leader of the Molls, uttered as he was pushed to his knees infront of him.

Aegon pushed off his helmet as blood dripped down before he placed it to the side.

"And what dishonor have I done," he asked as he looked the man in the eye.

"You divided us. Made half of us turn on our ways as they bent the knee to you outsiders. And now you come here and slaughter us, using trickery and other magic of the sort to find our caves!" he screamed, and it was uncanny how close the man was to the truth, yet he would never tell it to him.

It had come to him as a surprise, yet there was a reason that House Royce could trace their lineage to the times of the First Men. The ability to see through the eyes of an animal, warning or otherwise called as skin changing. It had come as a surprise to him, yet thankfully for him his knowledge had allowed him an insight into this gift and over the years he had been able to train with it.

And now this very ability had allowed him to deal with the Mountain clansmen, a feat that no Vale lord had been able to accomplish in a hundred years.

"I gave you and your clan fair terms. Ben the knee and keep your lands. I went even as far as to guarantee you and your clans food and grain for a year as long as you kept the King's peace," and those were generous terms. Half the clans had taken them and now had become part of the Vale.

They were not given the full lordly title, but smaller titles of landed knights with one of the clans being granted a masterly title with them being chosen as the representatives of the mountain clans at court.

Many a lord had dithered at those terms speaking of the various crimes the clans had committed against them and their people, and there were many The mountain clansmen had killed villages, raped women, and stolen away gold and grain.

Yet, using Jeyne's authority and the goodwill he had bought with his own actions over the years, he was able to make the lords agree to those terms, hoping that this would provide a permanent solution to this problem and make Vale a whole lot safer.

His gamble had worked, and he had been able to convince half the clans to bend the knee and for the rest well, he was not known as the Bloody Prince for no reason.

Instead of one massive offense he had given the problem the attention it had deserved and had made preparations for a long and arduous campaign, a campaign that would involve less courage and more trickery for with the advantage in terrain held by the Mountain clansmen facing them head on was nothing but idiocy.

"You would make kneelers out of us. And for what, living in our own lands!" The clan leader complained.

"Your brethren chose to join the fold, and you did not. The terms I offered were very generous considering the crimes you and your clansmen have committed against my people. Now it is too late," he said as he reached for his sword.

"Choose. The Black or the Block?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

"You already know," he screamed as the men pushed his head down. And Aegon gripped his blade as he took a long breath.

"Then so be it. I shall make it quick," and with that, he raised his blade and then swung it down.

CHUNK!

His head was cleaved in a single strike, a task which was not as easy as it was often made to seem.

His head rolled off on the ground as his blood splattered on the ground.

"Take it away, and have the Silent sisters treat the bodies of their fallen alongside our own. We shall give them all a proper burial," he ordered, and the men nodded as they took away the body, making him sigh.

He had been on the campaign for nearly a year now. He would leave for some time, yet this campaign had lasted around two years, but now it was done. And as he had promised their liege lady and the lords, the Mountain clansmen were conquered with Vale and its people more secure than they had been in years.

"Aegon," he heard his name being called out and turned to the side and saw one of his cousins Willam rushing towards him, a massive smile on his face.

"We did it. We did it," he screamed happily, as he came and hugged him.

William was a few years older than him, with brown curvy hair and a broad face. He was a cousin of their from a collateral line, and had often joined him in his lessons at Runestone before he went away to the Eyrie.

"You were right, the maps that you drew and the paths that you found for us. They were all there," he added, and Aegon smiled. Of course, they would be there; he had seen them for himself, after all.

"I still do not get how you are able to get the intel out of the prisoners like that. We had tried everything, but they refused to give up anything. If you walk in, they spill all their secrets away. What the hell do you even do to them?"

"Well, it wouldn't really be a secret if I told it to you now, would it," Aegon teased, and his cousin laughed before he suddenly shook his head and reached into his pocket.

"A missive came for you from the Eyrie. The Lady Jeyne wishes for you to ride back to the Eyrie at once," and he was taken aback by the decision. He had planned to ride back with the army and could think of no immediate reason that would demand this.

And as he read the message, he realized just what had happened. And how could he forget it?

The Queen was with child, and he had been called to the capital.

"Have them prepare a horse for me. I will leave today."

0000

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