Redemption of the Dragon

Act 2 – Prophesy or Conspiracy · Chapter 13: Road to Freedom

Tom woke before the horn.

For a moment, he did not move.

That, by itself, felt strange.

No chains bit his wrists. No ship creaked beneath him. No arena sand waited beyond a barred door. No shouted order dragged him upright before his thoughts had found their names. There was only the narrow bed, the grey room high in Oros, the smell of old stone and salt wind, and Vissenya curled carefully against his side as if the night had taught them both where pain allowed closeness.

She was already awake.

He knew before he opened his eyes. Her breathing was too even. Too deliberate. Her fingers rested lightly against his chest, not sleeping-heavy, but present. Holding the shape of him while she could.

"You are pretending," he murmured.

"So are you."

His mouth almost smiled.

He opened his eyes.

Dawn had not fully entered the room yet. It gathered at the window in a pale line, silver at first, then soft gold along the cracked sill. The carved dragon on the ceiling beam looked less crooked in that light. Or mayhaps Tom had simply become kinder to crooked things.

Vissenya lay with her head near his shoulder, hair loose across the blanket, face turned enough that he could see the bruised shadows beneath her eyes. The bandages at her throat and wrists were clean. That was something. Not enough, but something. Her beauty had not been lessened by the wounds. Changed, mayhaps. Made more difficult to look at because now he could not see it without remembering the room where he had found her.

Her fingers moved once against his tunic.

"You should still be sleeping," he said.

"So should you."

"I have to leave."

"I know."

Neither said more.

Words had become things with hooks in them.

If he said he would return, she would hear every man who had ever said it and failed. If she told him to be careful, he would hear that she knew he could not promise it. If either of them named what had changed between them, the dawn might become too small to hold it.

So they lay in the last pocket of warmth the night had left them and listened to Oros wake.

Boots in the corridor.

A distant shout from the yard.

The grind of a gate chain.

Somewhere below, a horse objected to being saddled before the sun had committed itself to the day. A man cursed in Ghiscari. Another answered in Valyrian. The castle, taken and retaken, breathed around them like a wounded beast deciding whether to live.

Light crossed the floor.

Tom rose when it touched the foot of the bed.

Reluctantly did not cover the half of it.

He sat up slowly, because Cleyton's stitches punished pride and sudden motion with equal enthusiasm. Vissenya released him at once, though her fingers lingered until the last possible heartbeat. He pulled on his boots, fastened his belt, checked his knife, his sword, his cloak, his waterskin. Simple tasks. Familiar tasks.

Leave-taking tasks.

When he turned, she had pushed herself upright against the wall.

"Do not," he began.

Her look stopped him.

Tom went to her instead.

They embraced with the careful awkwardness of the wounded. Her arms came around his neck despite the bandages at her wrists. His hands found her back and held without pressing where the cuts lay hidden beneath linen. She was warm. Alive. Angry at her own weakness. Afraid for him and too proud to make the fear a plea.

He could feel all of it.

Mayhaps she could feel the same in him.

She lifted her face.

The kiss was passionate, not gentle.

Not at first.

It had too much unsaid in it for gentleness. Relief. Want. Fury at time. The memory of chains. The knowledge that dawn did not care what night had allowed. Tom kissed her as if a kiss could become a vow without speaking, and Vissenya answered as if she understood precisely how foolish and necessary that was.

When they parted, both were breathing harder.

Neither spoke.

That was the mercy of it.

Tom touched his forehead to hers once, then stepped away before his resolve learned any new arguments.

Vissenya watched him go.

Only after he reached the door did she lower herself back to the bed, one hand pressed briefly to her side where pain had returned to claim its due.

Tom left before he turned back.

The yard below smelled of wet ash, blood scrubbed badly from stone, horses, leather, and the sea.

Oros at dawn was uglier than Oros in battle.

Battle had made everything simple by making everything immediate. Now the castle showed its costs. Broken gate timbers leaned against the wall. The crater remained roped off near the fountain, its dark stone still drawing wary glances. Bodies had been taken away, but absence had its own shape. Blood browned between the paving stones. A scaffold had collapsed along the north wall and left a spiderwork of beams across the yard.

Men worked anyway.

That was what men did when ruins were not allowed to remain ruins.

Tom crossed toward the gate and stopped.

Several Ghiscari stood along the wall walk.

Not prisoners.

Not exactly.

They wore no helms, and their shields had been taken, but they stood with spears in hand under the eyes of two Tears archers. One was the legionary Tom remembered kneeling in the yard the day before, dark curls visible now without bronze. Another had a bandage wrapped around his jaw. A third was older, with scar tissue pulling one eye half shut. They watched the approaches with the tense discipline of men who had served one master yesterday and were trying to survive the meaning of serving another today.

Tom's hand moved toward his sword before he stopped it.

"They have sworn."

Ser Kemal stood near the gatehouse arch, arms folded, his own armor buckled and plain. He looked as if he had slept standing up and considered it indulgence.

"To the Tears?" Tom asked.

"To the cause. To Aemon. To you. Their wording varies."

Tom frowned. "To me?"

"Many saw what happened."

"A stone fell."

"And you killed Maegor."

"That was not divine either."

"Men need fewer facts than you think to make faith."

Tom looked back at the Ghiscari on the wall. One of them noticed his attention and bowed his head.

Tom looked away.

"Do you trust them?" he asked.

"No."

"Good."

Kemal's mouth twitched. It might have been approval. It might have been contempt warming itself by the same fire.

"I am testing them a few at a time," he said. "Small duties. Watched posts. Work that matters but does not yet place a knife at our throat. Some are soldiers before they are anything else. They respect discipline. They respect survival. They saw the Tears hold against them, then saw the sky break their courage. That makes room for new loyalty."

"And the sellswords?"

"Less room."

"You trust them less."

"I trust their motivation more clearly. Coin, fear, chance. Those are honest motives, but they change masters quickly. I will use them carefully, or not at all."

Boro came from the stables leading his horse and overheard the last part.

"I was a sellsword once."

Kemal looked at him.

Boro sighed. "Point accepted."

Mera followed with two packs slung over one shoulder. "He was also bad at it."

"I was memorable."

"People remember fevers."

Tom almost laughed.

Almost was becoming easier.

The company gathered near the gate in pieces. Jory came first, as always, with everything already packed and his expression arranged into patient disapproval at whatever reckless thing Tom might decide next. Salla arrived quiet as fog, bow unstrung for travel but knives ready. Darro carried three extra waterskins and looked offended by all of them. Corren came with a short spear. Two others from the former slave band joined him: Nesaro, the Lysene with one missing ear, and Qavo, who had been a fisherman before debt and chains had taught him silence.

Then Aemon arrived with eight riders.

Tom looked at them and immediately said, "No."

Aemon did not slow. "Good morning to you as well."

"I said a small group."

"This is smaller than the group I wanted."

"It is larger than the group I agreed to."

"You agreed to nothing specific."

Jory looked toward the sky as if asking it for strength and expecting, after yesterday, that it might answer with a stone.

Aemon stopped before Tom. He was dressed for the road back to Elyria, dark cloak clasped at one shoulder, Valyrian steel at his hip. The night's rest had done little for the shadows under his eyes. Still, he looked more himself than he had since the message from Oros had reached him.

"These riders know the broken roads," he said. "Two speak enough YiTish to be insulted properly. One has traded with the exile towns. One has seen Lo Feng's sigil before. All have served the Tears longer than you have known we exist."

"That is not the point."

"It is several points."

"A larger group moves slower."

"A dead small group moves not at all."

Tom glanced at Kemal, expecting no help and receiving exactly that.

"Take them," Kemal said.

"You too?"

"Especially me."

"I thought you wanted the castle held."

"I do. That is why I want you to survive long enough that this rescue does not become a second disaster I must later repair."

Boro nodded solemnly. "That was almost fond."

"It was not."

"I heard concern."

"You heard tactics."

Mera said, "Concern in armor."

Kemal ignored them with the discipline of a man preserving his sanity by force.

Tom looked over the eight riders. Men and women both. Weathered. Armed lightly, but not poorly. No banners. No bright colors. One had narrow eyes and a crescent scar along her chin. One was old enough to be Tom's father and sat a horse like sleep had been invented beneath him. Another carried a curved bow wrapped in oilcloth.

They did look useful.

That annoyed him.

"Fine," Tom said.

Aemon's brows lifted. "That was swifter than expected."

"I am wounded and tired. Enjoy the advantage."

"I shall treasure it."

Cleyton came down from the keep at a pace that suggested every stair had personally offended him. He carried two map cases, a cloth-wrapped packet, and a stack of notes tied with red thread.

"Maps," he said, thrusting one case at Tom and the other at Jory because he trusted Jory with paper more than most men with swords. "Routes, bad routes, worse routes, and one route that may kill you less dramatically if the weather holds. Notes on Lo Feng. Notes on the House of the Exiled Dawn. Notes on the town, though I warn you every account contradicts the last in ways only frightened travelers and smugglers can manage."

"Thank you," Tom said.

Cleyton blinked. "Do not thank me yet. I also included a list of things not to eat, touch, breathe deeply near, bargain with, or insult."

Boro leaned over. "Am I on the list?"

"Repeatedly."

"Good. I like being remembered."

Cleyton turned to Tom and lowered his voice. "The dragon was wounded when delivered. Wing membrane damaged, the scroll said. That may slow transport, but if Lo Feng knows what he has, he will not leave it exposed long."

"How far?"

"If the prisoner told true and the road has not changed under ashfall, two weeks at a punishing pace. More if you detour. Less if you are foolish and lucky."

"We have practice with both."

"That is not comforting."

"No."

Cleyton looked as if he wanted to say a dozen things and trusted none of them to help.

In the end, he said, "Come back with fewer holes."

Tom nodded. "Keep her alive."

The former maester's face softened by a fraction. "That I can do."

Aemon and Tom faced one another beside the gate while horses shifted impatiently around them.

For a heartbeat, the space between them held every argument they had not finished. Authority. Need. Oros. Elyria. The Tears. The way men had knelt. The way command had found Tom and made Aemon wary in ways neither of them had time to name.

Then Aemon offered his hand.

Tom took it.

"Do not become a story before you understand what men will do with it," Aemon said.

"I am trying not to."

"Try harder."

"You sound like Cleyton."

"A wound we both must bear."

Tom smiled faintly.

Aemon's grip tightened once, then released.

"Find the dragon," he said.

"Hold the Tears together."

"That is the harder task."

"Likely."

Kemal clasped Tom's forearm next.

"Listen to Jory," he said.

Jory, already mounted, said, "Finally, a sensible order."

"Listen to Mera when Jory is too gentle."

Mera smiled with teeth.

"And when Boro speaks," Kemal continued, "consider doing the opposite."

Boro put a hand to his heart. "Parting wounds me."

"Good. Then you are warned."

No one lingered after that.

Lingering made departure heavier.

Aemon rode west with his escort, toward the mainland roads that would return him to Elyria and the wounded order waiting there. Kemal remained beneath the gatehouse, already turning to give instructions to the Ghiscari on the wall. Cleyton stood beside him, arms full of notes he had not meant to keep holding, watching Tom's company form on the eastern road.

Tom did not look toward Vissenya's window.

Not at first.

Then he did.

She stood there, pale behind the narrow glass, one hand braced against the frame.

Too far for words.

Close enough.

Tom touched two fingers to his brow, not quite a salute, not quite a promise.

Vissenya lifted her hand.

Then the road bent, and Oros began to fall behind them.

The days stretched.

At first, every mile felt stolen from his own body.

The wounds from Oros did not care about purpose. His ribs burned when he rode too long. His calf tightened until dismounting became a negotiation. The cut on his forearm reopened twice before Jory threatened to tie the bandage with fishing knots learned from men who hated comfort. Boro complained enough for all of them, which may have been generosity in disguise. Mera claimed it was not. Salla watched the ridges. Darro watched the road behind. The Tears riders watched everything.

They traveled through lands that seemed determined to prove the world could remember violence longer than men could.

The road east of Oros passed through valleys where ash lay under the soil like old snow. Grass grew in patches, stubborn and thin. Streams ran warm in places and tasted of minerals. At night, vents glowed faintly among distant rocks, red eyes opening and closing with the wind. Ruined pillars marked forgotten stations. Twice they passed bones too large for horses and too old for names, half sunk into earth.

Tom learned the names of Aemon's riders because men and women who might die beside him deserved more than usefulness.

Serra of Valysar had the crescent scar and spoke three trade tongues badly enough to make men underestimate how much she understood. Old Rovan rode as if born in a saddle and could find water by watching birds that Tom had not noticed existed. Larra and Vosh were siblings from Selhorys, both narrow-faced and quiet, one with a bow and one with knives. Daxos had once traded saffron, glass, and secrets between ports before deciding secrets paid less reliably than fear. The others were Nym, Pol, and Hareth, each with their own silences.

They did not become friends.

Not quickly.

But they became a company.

That was more useful.

They prepared while they traveled because wounds and planning had become the rhythm of Tom's life.

At dawn, those fit enough trained lightly. Footwork beside cold stones. Grip work from horseback. Knife counters at half speed so stitches did not become sacrifices to pride. Kemal was absent, but his voice lived unpleasantly in everyone who had survived him. Jory corrected Tom's guard with a look. Mera corrected Boro's with the flat of a blade. Boro claimed this was affection. Mera said affection would leave fewer bruises.

At midday, Cleyton's notes came out.

Lo Feng had been a war captain, mayhaps. Or a magistrate's son. Or a rebel. Or the bastard nephew of a prince whose name none of the accounts agreed upon. He had led exiles west after some failed power struggle in Yi Ti and built a town beyond the ash hills where the old roads narrowed between black ridges. Some called the place Dawnhold. Some called it Feng's Rest. One account called it the Town of Open Gates, which Jory distrusted immediately.

"Names like that are traps," he said.

Daxos nodded. "Or invitations."

"Same thing."

The House of the Exiled Dawn sounded less like a house than a court built by men who had lost one. They traded with smugglers, bought old books, hired mercenaries in small numbers, and sent polite gifts to powerful people too distant to visit. They disliked red priests. They disliked Qartheen warlocks. They disliked being called YiTish exiles by anyone without an army.

"Everyone dislikes accurate names," Boro said.

Mera looked at him. "Arena meat?"

"I accept correction."

At night, they spoke of the dragon.

Not always directly.

Men did not like saying too often that they were riding toward a chained creature that could burn them if rescue went poorly and break their hearts if rescue came too late. So they spoke around it. Chains. Wagons. Nets. How to cut iron links quickly. Whether a wing wound could ground something large enough to tear through timber. Whether a frightened dragon would understand help when it arrived carrying steel.

"No," Jory said.

Tom looked at him across the small, buried fire. "No?"

"A frightened beast understands fear first."

"Then what?"

"You give it fewer reasons to fear you than the others."

That answer followed Tom for days.

The road turned harsher.

Villages vanished. Then trees. Then birds. They crossed a cracked plain under a white sky where heat shimmered even when the air was cool. One horse went lame and had to be traded to a charcoal burner who appeared from nowhere with three mules, two missing fingers, and no interest in questions. Rovan said this was fortunate. Boro said he hated fortune when it came with mules.

They detoured around a ravine where the old road had collapsed into steam. They lost half a day to rain that fell warm and left grey streaks on cloaks. Tom's wounds closed slowly. Too slowly for his liking. Vissenya remained in his thoughts with the stubbornness of pain and the warmth of memory, but the road gave him enough work that longing became bearable by being interrupted.

Some nights he slept.

Some nights he dreamed of a dragon with a scar above one eye dragging chains through ash while men knelt to stones.

On the twelfth day, Serra found fresh wagon tracks in a dry wash.

Heavy.

Guarded.

Eastbound.

They followed at a distance for two days, not close enough to see the wagons but close enough to read what they left behind. Ash churned by wheels. A broken chain link half buried near a campfire. Goat bones. One patch of scorched earth where nothing else in the camp had burned.

No one joked much after that.

On the fourteenth evening, Rovan pointed to a line of black hills on the horizon.

"Two days," he said.

"To the town?" Tom asked.

"To the first eyes watching for it."

They made camp that night in a shallow bowl between low ridges, no fire, tents dark against darker stone. Watches were doubled. Horses were watered in silence. Tom sat in his tent with Jory, Mera, Boro, Serra, and Daxos, studying Cleyton's least contradictory map by shielded lantern light.

"If the road narrows here," Serra said, tapping the parchment, "they will have a watch post on either side."

Daxos shook his head. "Too obvious."

"Obvious works when the road gives no alternative."

"Unless there is an alternative no one sells to outsiders."

Boro leaned closer. "I vote we find the secret road."

Mera said, "That is not a plan."

"It is a preference."

Tom rubbed at the bridge of his nose. His head ached. The lantern made the ink swim.

"We need eyes closer," he said. "Not tonight. Before dawn. Serra, Larra, Salla–"

A blade touched his throat.

No one moved.

The tent had not rustled.

No shadow had crossed the lantern.

No boot had scraped stone.

One breath, they had been six people arguing over a map.

The next, a woman crouched behind Tom with a short curved blade resting lightly beneath his jaw.

Jory's sword was half drawn before the blade touched skin.

"Do not," the woman said.

Her Common was accented, but clear.

Mera's hand had vanished beneath the map edge where her knife waited. Boro had gone very still, which was more alarming than any shout. Serra's eyes moved once toward the tent flap and back.

Tom did not swallow.

The blade was too close.

"If you were here to kill me," he said, "I would be dead."

"Yes."

"That is irritating."

"For you."

Jory's voice was quiet enough to be dangerous. "Move the knife."

"When I am certain no one will be foolish."

Boro said, "That may take years."

"Boro," Mera warned.

The woman behind Tom shifted just enough for him to feel movement rather than see it. She smelled faintly of smoke, dust, and some sharp oil he did not know. Her hand was steady. Not shaking, not pressing, not eager. Professional.

"You are Tom," she said.

"Aye."

"The northern one."

"Usually."

"You travel with former slaves, Tears riders, and too much haste."

"That sounds like us."

"You seek the dragon taken by Lo Feng."

The tent tightened around the words.

Tom kept his voice even. "Who are you?"

The blade left his throat.

Not far.

But enough.

"Someone who could have killed you," she said, "and chose not to."

"Comforting," Boro muttered.

The woman stepped into the lantern light.

She was small and lean, with straight black hair tied high and a face shaped by sharp bones and long travel. Her eyes were dark, angled, and watchful in a way that made stillness seem like a weapon. She wore layered grey and brown cloth under a travel cloak dusted the color of the hills. No bright colors. No jewelry beyond a narrow black cord at her wrist. A second blade rested at her hip. A third, Tom suspected, waited somewhere less polite.

Jory did not sheathe his sword.

Neither did she ask him to.

"Name," Tom said.

She studied him for a long moment.

Then she looked at the map, at Cleyton's notes, at the marked roads, and finally back to Tom.

"Setzuko," she said.

Daxos drew in a breath. "That is an exile name."

"It is mine."

"You are one of Lo Feng's people," Serra said.

Setzuko's mouth tightened. "I was. The past tense is important."

"And now?"

For the first time, she seemed to consider the answer carefully rather than simply choose how much to reveal.

Her fingers moved to the black cord at her wrist. Twisted it once.

"Now I am what I have been for several years," she said. "A member of the Tears of Valyria."

Silence filled the tent.

Outside, one of the horses stamped softly.

Setzuko looked at Tom.

"And if you want the dragon alive," she said, "you are already late."

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Disclaimer: Frostfyre is a non-commercial fan fiction project inspired by a Realm of Thrones campaign for Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord and set in the world of A Song of Ice and Fire. All rights to those original settings and characters remain with their respective owners.