Chapter Text
Balerion, the God, was the oldest of the Valyrian pantheon. Shepherds had no need to worship war or science or prophecy, but they too knew of Death. Death was old and constant. Death was patient.
They worshipped the eternal, quiet end, sang for their dead as they buried them under gentle, grassy hills. They looked at the stars to search for their souls and received their messages from the dancing lights of the undisturbed skies, and the shapes of playing clouds.
Those times before times seemed endless, just as the grassy lands were, old and smelling of milk and sun and rain.
The Valyrians wandered. Their fortunes turned. Instead of sheep, horses and cattle, they tamed dragons. Instead of wandering green hills and meadows they built cities, grand towers and moved to the unconquered mountains.
They had new gods now: one for knowledge, one for warfare, one for love and one for dragons, one for time and dreams, one for rulers and so on and so forth. They had names, temples, festivals and sacred days, their own mountain among the fourteen. They were worshipped, all the ways a god could ever be wished to be worshipped.
The Valyrians did not forget Balerion.
The oldest, the surest, the most patient.
They sang his hymns at funerals, looking for his gaze in the darkness between the dancing flames of dragon fire, they looked for him in the darkness among the stars.
He was patient and eternal and gentle. All that lived would once belong to him, all roads and fates led to him.
So they lit a candle in his name in the houses of healing, imploring him to aid the work, to extend his patience further. They prayed to him in the birthing chambers, so he would wait long yet to meet the new soul. Warriors asked for his aid, not only to kill, but also to protect. Travellers asked him to guide their path, to keep them from treacherous paths.
All belonged to him anyways, what is a few more years?
Balerion was in every temple and in every house and grand palace, sitting like an old friend by the fires, watching over every soul.
...
The dragon egg, owned by the Targaryens, was blacker than the night, laid in the volcanic heat of the Mountain of the End Eternal, close to the black temple raised there.
The Targaryens were Dragon-lords, mighty in the world of men, less so among the Forty. No great lands controlled and no mountain sized dragons. Still, they were by no means without consequence. They were diplomats and scouts, often flying far and wild, a rather outgoing bunch by the measures of the Ruling Families. Why go anywhere, when you could be in the Capital? They sighed and shook their silver heads. Wandering, burning hearts they have, those Targaryens.
They were also a riot, usually, causing both scandal and wonder. Some artists, a few warriors, a surprising amount of Dreamers for such a small house. A Targaryen did once held the title of First Speaker of the Council, at the hight of their political might. Not bad at all.
Daenys Targaryen, a small toddling girl child insisted on visiting the egg every day. She was tiny, but her illustrious future was already written out for her. She would be the Lady of their house one day next to her brother and she would be a priestess of Shrykos. That was a goddess of great many domains, but Daenys' fate with her laid in her Dreams and the power they held. Shrykos waved the threads of time, guarded Fate and Chance, she alone knew the Great Song that was written before the world was made and that determined all paths. She had gifted Valyrians the Dreams and revealed to them the future in glimpses.
Daenys dreamed. Her dreams took her to far distant lands and great fires and great snows. She was afraid, but the priestesses told her to be brave and true. The gift of the Goddess was a gift.
The black egg hatched on a most auspicious day: it was the festival of Shrykos, the longest day of the year. It was a time when the borders of the world grew thin and washed together. The priestesses got drunk and merry and the people danced and sung on the streets, hoping to see into days yet to come. The great houses searched for guidance and prophecies, and great sacrifices were made for Shrykos.
Daenys should have been in the goddess' temple, but she slipped away. She sat in the shadow of the dark temple of Death in silence, her eyes on the egg that shallowed all light, so heated now that the air trembled around it.
And there, as the Sun disappeared behind the western mountains, the Moon hanging perfectly above it like a celestial goodbye and the singing grew the loudest, the hard shell cracked and a tiny, black head poked out from the egg.
Daenys reached for the newborn dragon and it climbed onto her hand, a creature straight from the lightless void clinging to a small, white hand and cooing softly.
"Hello, Balerion. Hello. We will be great friends and fly in the sky, I just know." Her finger run down on his snout and he blinked slowly, tilting his head like a confused kitten. He was small yet. He would not remain so.
He would be the dragon for those who dealt in Death, either giving it out or shielding against it. Or both. He would be the dragon for conquerors, but most of all... Balerion would be the dragon of great Dreamers.
...
The slave rebellion happened when she was only twelve. The people rose after another grand sacrifice, some two thousand children killed on the altar of the Goddess of Love and Birth and Children, their still beating hearts tossed into the sacred fires. Daenys was not there, crying in her rooms alone. Her father told her it was right and necessary, that the Gods demanded their tribute, that it was for more heathy babes. Babes that actually mattered and could do great things in the world, instead of slave children who would go to labor in the mines anyways.
Daenys nodded, but cried none the less.
The slaves in the end seemed to agree with her sentiments and rose in rebellion. They managed to kill two priests hailing from the Forty and tossed a dozen dragon eggs down the volcanos. The punishment was severe and immediate. The Ruling families decided that they would put the fear of their power in their slaves once more and that one in every ten would be killed.
Once Daenys heard she fell on her knees and begged and wept. "Let them go, Father, please. Let them go far. The will cause us no trouble, please." And Aenar Targaryen had one great weakness, her daughter's pleading eyes and so he let the slaves destined for execution go. He packed them onto a ship and sent them in the direction of some suspected escape trails.
Of the many slaves of the Capital, only those belonging to House Targaryen escaped their doom.
...
That night Daenys Dreamed again. Suspended among the stars there was a woman who was a dragon who was and endless turning circle, tail and head and wings coming one after another, spinning endlessly. She was and eye and a fire, the heavens around her singing in a thousand voices, yet forming one melody.
"Hello Child." Said the stars.
"Shrykos."
"You are kind. Your heart is tender. Kindness and love will be the salvation of your House. By love the World will be delivered from Darkness." There were a thousand eyes and a thousand ghosts gazing at her.
"That's a good prophecy." Said Daenys.
Then the world tilted and she Dreamed of Valyria burning.
...
Dreams were warnings of the Gods, but it was only Daenys who dreamed of the Doom. Shyrkos did not warn any other. Not the other houses, not the priestesses, not the great Councilmen. Only Daenys. The Gods seemed to have abandoned the rest of the Freehold.
Daenys tried to warn everyone who would listen, but she was laughed away at every turn. It ended with her being banned from the Temple of Shyrkos, for how could it be that a novice foresaw what a grand priestess could not?
In truth, there was only one man who believed Daenys completely, but he was also the only one Daenys needed to believe. One day Aenar sold their mansion, packed their belongings and their household onto their ships and sailed west.
The great Dragon-lords shook their silver heads. What feeble hearted fools these Targaryens are. As if Valyria would ever fall.
Daenys flew among the burning red clouds atop ever-dark Balerion and looked back above her shoulder at the great city. The fourteen volcanos, the towers reaching for the heavens, the white streets and the green parks. The hundreds of dragons, inhabiting the skies. It was beautiful and it was already lost. She knew in her heart that she would never see it again and she looked west, into the setting sun, towards the wild, lawless continent that laid beyond the sea.
...
Daenys died on Dragonstone and old woman. Balerion lived. His mournful song traveled across the dark waters. It might have just traveled to the silent, mourning Moon too.
...
Balerion was the dragon of a Great Dreamer. When one of the flame souled Dreamers come to him again, he lowered his head once more and took to the skies with a new rider. But Aegon was no Daenys. He did Dream of Doom but he was not as kind as Daenys. He did not have her gentle heart and he did not run his fingers along Balerion's nose as Daenys once did, no matter how fearsome the her dragon grew.
Aegon reminded Balerion that there were more ways to serve Death, and that evading it by dreams and defying it with a burning soul of starlight was only one path.
Aegon served Death in his own way and Balerion burned thousands, his flames engulfing many little, cold creatures.
...
Then come Maegor. He did not Dream. He did burn and command. He was as different from Daenys as one could be, but Balerion was a dragon of Death as well as Dreams and he served. It seemed there was only one Daenys and all who followed her would demand only dark flames and his shadow upon the world, to terrify the other small ones. Balerion even torn apart another dragon, one he knew before. Small and quick and playful, silver like the lights dancing on the waves.
After Maegor died, Balerion decided he had enough for a while. He spread his great wings and turned east once more, towards an old home resting in a fiery grave. He would return when the time was right and when he'd have a flame souled rider with a heart to match Daenys' once more, and no sooner.
...
Daeron was so nervous he could feel the bile in his throat. The only reason he didn't vomit was that he haven't eaten much in two days and that was not a reassuring though as he sat swaying in the saddle, preparing to ride into a fight for the death.
He wanted nothing to do with it, quite frankly. He wanted sweet oblivion, to escape from the imminent, pressing dread accompanying all his waking moments, born of all his dreaming ones.
The future was clouded as ever, but always dark and Daeron wished to not be in the know. He knew, knew even before his grandfather's commanding missive even arrived, that they would come to Ashford. He knew their fates would be decided in the mud, knew that something would grew horribly wrong.
And so it did.
Daeron told his father before, that Aerion would get someone killed one day and to Daeron it felt that the day has come. His father gave him a look so dark and furious back then, that Daeron had to shut up and not much was done about the broken wrist of the servant boy who angered Aerion. Daeron rued all his cowardly silences now, when the reckoning was here.
Before his uncle rode out, Daeron was halfway calm. There were three dragons on the field and if one of them was to die, it was probably Daeron. He had no taste for a violent death, but in the grand scheme of things he didn't mind it so much either. Better he died than his father, certainly. And Aerion would die a madman swallowing fire in some years, far from Ashford.
So Daeron was calm, if a little put out. It was not ideal, but it was fine. His father would be rid of his shame at last. He would rage and grumble, but Daeron was sure he'd shorty see the advantages of the new arrangement and be pleased that Daeron at least died in a fight instead of face down in a ditch. So that was fine.
He was calm until Baelor Targaryen rode into the field and then he knew with great clarity and growing horror, if a dragon was to fall that day, it would not be Daeron. No. It would be Baelor Breakspear, dead for honour and the hubris of his fool nephews. And Daeron's father would be destroyed.
He looked to his father with a plea on his tongue, but Maekar turned away, paying no attention to his blabbering eldest about to dissolve into panic.
The sun nearly rose and they were at most minutes away from the start of the Trial. Daeron breathed in and out, his eyes closed as he prayed to gods he didn't really believe in.
The rest of the world seemed to fall away, a strange buzzing in his ears. And then- thunder in the distance.
The prince lifted his head, his eyes scanning the grey sky. There were clouds aplenty but it didn't seem to warrant thunder. As he looked around, no-one else seemed to be noticing, everyone focused on the field.
His hands trembled, his heartbeat so loud he could feel it in his ears.
He looked to the sky again. He didn't know what he was looking for, but as he tried to look away, he found he could't.
Thunder, again. Closer now.
There, a shadow in the clouds. Something moving. Some strange storm gathering above them? The fury of the gods?
For a few seconds a shadow passed over the meadow.
There was something up there, Daeron knew, something alive and moving. Dark and deadly, a winged shadow, fire, doom, dread, Dread, death, a flame, a dream, something impossible. Coming, closer now, closer...
Before he had time to yell, to call for his father, to even begin to comprehend, the sky truly darkened and with the announcement of a roar so loud even the ground shook with it, at once night descended in Ashford meadow in the shape of a dragon.
Daeron had the honour and the horror to see the whole thing, given that his eyes were already on the sky. The shape above broke through the greyness, a single beat of its wings chasing away the clouds themselves. Then the dragon dived.
Daeron underestimated how high the clouds were, how big the dragon was. Its descend seemed endless, for all it was rapidly getting bigger to closer it got. Still so high up in the air, and its dark wings already stole all the light from the meadow. Blacker than the deepest night.
People were screaming, pushing each other on the strands. Aerion was laughing as a maniac. Daeron watched in silence, half in a dream, half more awake than he's ever been.
The dragon flew lower. It circled above the tourney fields and then landed slowly. The ground shook.
The beast was. It was. Gigantic.
Also strangely careful, standing above them all, its hind legs somewhere beyond the sea of tents, one of its wigs on the field, the other behind the viewing stands.
The dragon moved its head, looking down. The movement seemed slow somehow, despite the fact that it took the dragon a second the move its head from one side of the field to the other.
The dragon looked down and Daeron looked up and those old, burning dark eyes burrowed into his of all people.
Something infinitely ancient and vast pressed up against Daeron's own soul, his whole being laid bare before the dragon and he felt known and judged and understood. Something snapped into place and Daeron couldn't comprehend how he could possibly have lived before it.
The dragon blinked, slow as a cat, his head lowering slowly.
In some strange way, Daeron though, they met each other before. The dragon let out a purr, Daeron feeling it in his very bones. They will be friends, the prince knew. They will fly high and fly forever.
"Balerion." He whispered and recognised it to be the truth.
The history books told that Balerion the Black Dread was large enough that an ox pulled cart could comfortably be driven down his throat, if only he let such a thing happen.
The histories were rather underselling the old dragon. As his gigantic head stopped before Daeron it become apparent that even on the top of his agitated horse he couldn't possibly reach even the bottom of Balerion's mouth. If they stacked three horses on top of each other, maybe.
Still, he reached forward a trembling pale hand. Perhaps it should have been a scary thought, but Daeron, ever the coward, did not feel a single ounce of hesitation. Balerion was the last being on the face of the planet who would ever hurt him.
He laid his palm against a black scale on the dragon's chin, a scale that was about the size of half a horse. It was hot to the touch and dry. Daeron could now feel under his palm the answering purr.
"Hello. Hello, Balerion. I think I've been waiting for you for a long time."
The dragon pushed forward very very gently, just a single breath closer against his hand and Daeron let out a wet laugh.
The World changed. The Song long written uncurled and disappeared like smoke. Paths that Daeron knew before, glimpses he saw as shards of broken mirrors showing only horror rearranged themselves, snapping into place. The future, disorderly and dark before now flowed like water before his mind, flowed like a gentle song, reaching far as threads of silk instead of visions of madness.
Only one great, dark dragon would descend on Ashford that day.
Daeron smiled, tears on his face, his forehead resting against Balerion. "You. You made me wait a long time." He whispered in Valyrian. The answering grumble was sheepish and a little apologetic, the feeling of a long, deep nap entering Daeron's mind as an explanation.
Daeron could only laugh.