Chapter 44: Shake On It
Flightless Man
Versed in the lewd.
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Chapter 44: Shake On It
Theon Greyjoy
Theon Greyjoy
Watching Rodrik sail off for the Arbor is a strangely freeing feeling. It's only me left on Pyke now and Father has already insisted I start pulling my own weight. With Maron fallen in the attack on Seaguard and Asha in Oldtown with her new Tyrell husband, I'm going to have to train with Uncle Aeron's crew.
Despite Victarion's claim of the dead rising beyond the Wall, Euron has been sent to reclaim the ships stolen by the craven. Abandoning us for the Basilisk Isles has let the North and Vale purge their lands far too quickly.
The Hightowers have barely managed to secure the Rock and won't have long to enforce the change in Westerland leadership. It's obvious even to me, that our allies on the mainland aren't going to hold out for long against the now able to unite Kingdoms.
"You're old enough to wet your blade on greenlander blood." Smirks Father as he slams his empty mug onto the stained table, his driftwood crown tilting with the weight of a clam shell on the left side. "You'll sail with him and raid the Riverlands before they can deal with the Golden Company."
"He's only ten and two!" Mother tries to raise a complaint but gets shut down immediately.
With a drunken snarl, Father backhands hard enough to split her lip. "Exactly! He's already a year behind his brothers first kill." He growls bitterly as he thinks of Maron. "Theon cant laze about with you like a whore anymore. It's time he learns to be a man."
"Only for a few more moons and then I'll be three and ten." I find myself puffing my chest up when the men in the hall burst into mocking laughter. "I want to go."
"I don't give a damn what you want Boy," Spits my Father with glassy eyes and pink cheeks. "You'll do what your King commands!"
"And what do you command Brother?" Aeron comes to my rescue with a look of pity thrown in my direction.
This question makes Father's smirk grow to an unsettling size. "The Freys are going to need help sacking Riverrun and I want you to bring back the older Targaryen girl. Your brother's children will have a claim on the entire Seven Kingdoms once she bleeds."
"Whatt aboutt Robert's bastard?" Aeron frowns at what seems to be a change in assignment.
"The Frey's lost her and six patrols have been torn apart as if by wild animals so far in the search." Snorting at the idea of animals fighting for some princess like it's a children's tale, Father snatches a fresh mug from the passing wench.
He swallows half the drink in a single breath and belches louder than the storm."Theon will just have to settle for a saltwife for now… If he has the balls to claim one that is."
His men roar with laughter and I feel my face go pink with shame. I'll show you just how brave I am on this raid Father, you won't be able to scorn me like this anymore.
…
Despite Victarion's claim of the dead rising beyond the Wall, Euron has been sent to reclaim the ships stolen by the craven. Abandoning us for the Basilisk Isles has let the North and Vale purge their lands far too quickly.
The Hightowers have barely managed to secure the Rock and won't have long to enforce the change in Westerland leadership. It's obvious even to me, that our allies on the mainland aren't going to hold out for long against the now able to unite Kingdoms.
"You're old enough to wet your blade on greenlander blood." Smirks Father as he slams his empty mug onto the stained table, his driftwood crown tilting with the weight of a clam shell on the left side. "You'll sail with him and raid the Riverlands before they can deal with the Golden Company."
"He's only ten and two!" Mother tries to raise a complaint but gets shut down immediately.
With a drunken snarl, Father backhands hard enough to split her lip. "Exactly! He's already a year behind his brothers first kill." He growls bitterly as he thinks of Maron. "Theon cant laze about with you like a whore anymore. It's time he learns to be a man."
"Only for a few more moons and then I'll be three and ten." I find myself puffing my chest up when the men in the hall burst into mocking laughter. "I want to go."
"I don't give a damn what you want Boy," Spits my Father with glassy eyes and pink cheeks. "You'll do what your King commands!"
"And what do you command Brother?" Aeron comes to my rescue with a look of pity thrown in my direction.
This question makes Father's smirk grow to an unsettling size. "The Freys are going to need help sacking Riverrun and I want you to bring back the older Targaryen girl. Your brother's children will have a claim on the entire Seven Kingdoms once she bleeds."
"Whatt aboutt Robert's bastard?" Aeron frowns at what seems to be a change in assignment.
"The Frey's lost her and six patrols have been torn apart as if by wild animals so far in the search." Snorting at the idea of animals fighting for some princess like it's a children's tale, Father snatches a fresh mug from the passing wench.
He swallows half the drink in a single breath and belches louder than the storm."Theon will just have to settle for a saltwife for now… If he has the balls to claim one that is."
His men roar with laughter and I feel my face go pink with shame. I'll show you just how brave I am on this raid Father, you won't be able to scorn me like this anymore.
…
Jaime Lannister
The moment my hand was severed, it felt like all my dreams got tossed overboard with it. Lynesse and her family have locked Kevan and his family in the depths of the Rock. If she births a son… it will be a lot harder for Father and Tyrion to reclaim our home.
The knowledge of how bloody a vengeance they will bring in retaliation is all that allowed me to endure the Ironborn's questioning. I ignore the fact that I can't be damaged in any long term way and what happened to the men I brought with me.
Finally in Oldtown where I am to spend the rest of this ramshackle rebellion, I've only been in he Hightower's deepest dungeon for a few hours before I hear the whispers Lynesse spoke of. The voice sounds wet and hisses with so many of it's fellows I lose track of how many different pitches watch me.
The mocking taunts of how not even Tyrion will have a use for me if I get freed, are the easiest to ignore. When the hisses bring up something only Cersei knows, I start to wonder if Lynesse was speaking the truth.
"Your son will be King once the second Stag dies." The smugness is thick like oil and makes me clamber to my feet. "Aren't you proud of betraying your King?"
"The Baratheon lout, is not my King!" I only serve him because my true King has commanded it.
Cackling from the hallways draws closer to my door and soon saltwater begins to flood in from under it. "But how will you serve Viserys, with only one hand?"
"I'll just need to learn how to fight with my left." I hadn't actually thought that far before now, too lost in my shock for the last few weeks. Not going to let some nightmares declare me useless.
"The ones who lived here before… they broke faith with us." The freezing water is already a foot deep and I'm forced to pull myself into the air with one of the hanging shackles. "They have also taken from you… have they not?" The one speaking now is wheezing more than the first one and has a far raspier voice.
"Are you talking about the Hightowers?"
The first creature hisses again with a very pleased tone. "Yes. And what if I offered you the chance to bring this vengeance in our name?"
"I'm kind of locked up and about to drown if you hadn't noticed." The water is almost at chest height even with the aid of the chain and I know I only have a few minutes left.. "You're also the one who seems to think I'm useless right now. Why are you even speaking with me?"
"Lannisters always pay their debts… this one will be quiet the long term repayment and we won't appreciate a second pact being broken." This time the voice is in the room with me and I can even see a pair of shadows swimming in circles around me. "If you wish to live… just hold out your stump."
I intend to drown and ignore the dark offer but find it growing more tempting by the second. When my lungs begin to burn and my vision grows dark, I lose the will to resist salvation.
My arm thrusts forward and I see a greenish blue claw emerge from the darkness to meet it. It's a scaled limb with six webbed fingers and a thumb on each side of it.
Pressing a black shape to my stump brings pain intense as a lightning bolt coursing through my body. I writhe in pain as disturbing visions flash before my eyes.
I see a sprawling city several times larger than King's Landing lining the both sides of an undersea canyon. The greasy black stone at first looks like shadows on the rock but I can soon make out buildings of impossible angles going all the way down to the black depths.
All of a sudden the occupants of the city look up at me simultaneously, with thousands of orange glimmering eyes filling me with overwhelming fear. I know they wish nothing but pain for any human they can't use and am already regretting my moment of weakness.
Bubbles erupt around me and I'm suddenly in the middle of a howling blizzard. A wave of water hundreds of feet high surges across the landscape and devastates entire forests.
The only reason I'm not washed away with the hundreds of fleeing people below, is the western side of the wave breaking against the foothills of the mountain peak I find myself standing on. The wave crashes into an endless horde of shrieking blue eyed bodies and breaks the army with the sheer mass of water.
When I think the wave will wash the dead out to sea, it suddenly stops in place. The rest of the water slams into the still part at the front, rising what has to be nearly a thousand feet in the air. It doesn't collapse once the movement is gone and I watch the full force of the blizzard slam into the water.
Freezing faster than I can even believe possible, the wave soon looks like the tales of the Wall. The snow still in the air whirls around me and I blink against the stinging cold on my eyes.
After the snow buries me and I fear I'm going to die anyway, I pull myself free with the last of my air.
I struggle to climb free from the snow and blink to clear my vision. Doing so reveals I'm no longer in my cell and I find myself clawing across a sandy beach a few miles outside of Oldtown.
My hands push into the sand still damp from high tide and I nearly collapse in shock. I have two hands!
Where I had a stump the last time I checked, I find my right wrist is bonded with a fist made of oily black stone. It's carved to perfection and reacts as if it was the one I was born with when I try flexing it.
"Give us the Hightowers or we will come for your entire family." I hear the raspy voice echo in my mind and I whirl around to find it nowhere in sight. "We are losing patience with your kind, this is your last chance."
The knowledge of how bloody a vengeance they will bring in retaliation is all that allowed me to endure the Ironborn's questioning. I ignore the fact that I can't be damaged in any long term way and what happened to the men I brought with me.
Finally in Oldtown where I am to spend the rest of this ramshackle rebellion, I've only been in he Hightower's deepest dungeon for a few hours before I hear the whispers Lynesse spoke of. The voice sounds wet and hisses with so many of it's fellows I lose track of how many different pitches watch me.
The mocking taunts of how not even Tyrion will have a use for me if I get freed, are the easiest to ignore. When the hisses bring up something only Cersei knows, I start to wonder if Lynesse was speaking the truth.
"Your son will be King once the second Stag dies." The smugness is thick like oil and makes me clamber to my feet. "Aren't you proud of betraying your King?"
"The Baratheon lout, is not my King!" I only serve him because my true King has commanded it.
Cackling from the hallways draws closer to my door and soon saltwater begins to flood in from under it. "But how will you serve Viserys, with only one hand?"
"I'll just need to learn how to fight with my left." I hadn't actually thought that far before now, too lost in my shock for the last few weeks. Not going to let some nightmares declare me useless.
"The ones who lived here before… they broke faith with us." The freezing water is already a foot deep and I'm forced to pull myself into the air with one of the hanging shackles. "They have also taken from you… have they not?" The one speaking now is wheezing more than the first one and has a far raspier voice.
"Are you talking about the Hightowers?"
The first creature hisses again with a very pleased tone. "Yes. And what if I offered you the chance to bring this vengeance in our name?"
"I'm kind of locked up and about to drown if you hadn't noticed." The water is almost at chest height even with the aid of the chain and I know I only have a few minutes left.. "You're also the one who seems to think I'm useless right now. Why are you even speaking with me?"
"Lannisters always pay their debts… this one will be quiet the long term repayment and we won't appreciate a second pact being broken." This time the voice is in the room with me and I can even see a pair of shadows swimming in circles around me. "If you wish to live… just hold out your stump."
I intend to drown and ignore the dark offer but find it growing more tempting by the second. When my lungs begin to burn and my vision grows dark, I lose the will to resist salvation.
My arm thrusts forward and I see a greenish blue claw emerge from the darkness to meet it. It's a scaled limb with six webbed fingers and a thumb on each side of it.
Pressing a black shape to my stump brings pain intense as a lightning bolt coursing through my body. I writhe in pain as disturbing visions flash before my eyes.
I see a sprawling city several times larger than King's Landing lining the both sides of an undersea canyon. The greasy black stone at first looks like shadows on the rock but I can soon make out buildings of impossible angles going all the way down to the black depths.
All of a sudden the occupants of the city look up at me simultaneously, with thousands of orange glimmering eyes filling me with overwhelming fear. I know they wish nothing but pain for any human they can't use and am already regretting my moment of weakness.
Bubbles erupt around me and I'm suddenly in the middle of a howling blizzard. A wave of water hundreds of feet high surges across the landscape and devastates entire forests.
The only reason I'm not washed away with the hundreds of fleeing people below, is the western side of the wave breaking against the foothills of the mountain peak I find myself standing on. The wave crashes into an endless horde of shrieking blue eyed bodies and breaks the army with the sheer mass of water.
When I think the wave will wash the dead out to sea, it suddenly stops in place. The rest of the water slams into the still part at the front, rising what has to be nearly a thousand feet in the air. It doesn't collapse once the movement is gone and I watch the full force of the blizzard slam into the water.
Freezing faster than I can even believe possible, the wave soon looks like the tales of the Wall. The snow still in the air whirls around me and I blink against the stinging cold on my eyes.
After the snow buries me and I fear I'm going to die anyway, I pull myself free with the last of my air.
I struggle to climb free from the snow and blink to clear my vision. Doing so reveals I'm no longer in my cell and I find myself clawing across a sandy beach a few miles outside of Oldtown.
My hands push into the sand still damp from high tide and I nearly collapse in shock. I have two hands!
Where I had a stump the last time I checked, I find my right wrist is bonded with a fist made of oily black stone. It's carved to perfection and reacts as if it was the one I was born with when I try flexing it.
"Give us the Hightowers or we will come for your entire family." I hear the raspy voice echo in my mind and I whirl around to find it nowhere in sight. "We are losing patience with your kind, this is your last chance."