Chapter Text
From a Doom
New flowers bloom
Maesters may fill scrolls debating the foresight of Daenys Targaryen, the ‘Dreamer’ who saw the fires that would consume Valyria nigh on one hundred and fifty years before the unification of Westeros. Such visions make for stirring tales, yet history is forged in blood and iron, not the whispers on the wind. Still, Aenar Targaryen, her sire, a dragonlord of middling rank in the Freehold, chose to believe.
Whether swayed by his daughter's fevered dreams, or by a colder calculation of his family's precarious standing after a disastrous venture in the land of Sothoryos, Aenar left for the cold shores of Dragonstone. He took Meraxes, his dragon, still a whelp, and clutches of precious eggs.
A prudent retreat? A coward's flight? A divine intervention? The answers differed to whom you ask.
Laughter greeted Aenar’s exile. His daughter’s dreams seemed foolish in hindsight and she was dead just a year into his exile. Ten years passed, and dwindling fortunes forced him reconsider his position.
But then the earth shook beneath the Summer Sea. A rumble was heard far and away.
Great walls of the sea water, dozens of meters tall, slammed onto the shores of the Freehold. It traveled further, to the shores of Stepstones in the west and Qarth to the east and Zametter and Yeen to the south. Those inland wished they perished sooner. A fate worse than the instant death offered by the tsunami was about to visit them. Fourteen Flames erupted. It belched out fire and death so hot dragons were incinerated. The ground moved like raging water and the mighty edifices of the Valyrians crumbled to dust.
The earth opened its mouth next. With it, the Lands of Long Summer were gone, torn asunder from Essos proper.
The Doom had come for Valyria.
If only it stopped there.
Volantis and Lys, the Ghis sisters of Yunkai, Meereen, and Astapor, were all destroyed. Worse was the ash. It blotted the sun, choked everything, and drenched the world in grey.
The singers called it ‘the Long Summer Night.’
Along the Rhoyne, the beating heart of the Freehold where the glittering jewels like Volon Therys, Sar Mell, Valysar, Selhorys, Qohor, and Norvos lay, black rain fell. Death followed. Crops, cattle, men, nothing was spared. A similar fate befell the Great Grass Sea.
Millions died all over the world.
For two thousand years, the Valyrian Freehold stood as the greatest civilization to whom everybody bowed. From the Bone Mountains of east to the shores of the Sunset Kingdoms. From the Freezing Sea in the north to the glittering Summer Sea in the south. It was built on dragons and magic. Remove the sheen and you will find the enslaved, the downtrodden, the vanquished, and the oppressed. They only knew the darkness of the dragon’s shadow. Even the gray skies, which brought nothing but death, seemed so bright after thousands of years under the shadow of the dragon.
Once glimpsed, they were never letting it go.
To the Valyrians, the world they knew crumbled. But the days of dragonlords were not truly over. In a quiet corner of the world, an unlikely scholar of Greater Valyrian blood witnessed the world turn mad. His name was Aurion and he wrote of it. The world of grey, of ash rains, and of Morghul who haunted the lands. In Qohor, where he lived, he wrote of hunger. Of thousands perishing every day. He wrote of the knives that came out for him.
He wrote of the terror of his flight.
Most importantly, he wrote of his Black Beast.
Balerion.
Then he wrote of the fire required to end the chaos. He wrote of Balerion growing fat on the bodies of all who dared to challenge the might of the dragons.
In the chaos of the Doom, when the Valyrians were being massacred left and right, and with Volantis–the first and the greatest of the Valyrian daughters– having collapsed, the destiny of all Valyrians fell upon this unlikely Aurion. With Qohor as his base, Aurion began the first of his Great Campaigns. On the 2nd Moon of 145 BC, with allies, like Monterys Vacar, Laegon Lennaris, Laemion and Maehedar Valyreious, he set out. From Qhoyne, a tributary of Rhoyne, to Upper and Little Rhoyne, coming down to the massive Dagger Lake, and from there to the Golden Fields.
Aurion was hailed as either a savior or a demon. The famous song, ‘Rȳbagon Rhoyno syt’, was composed to sing of Aurion flying along the Rhoyne on the Black Beast of his, doing the impossible of binding Valyria anew.
In 143 BC, Volantis came to sight.
A sight that made them weep. The greatest city outside of Freehold was being ruled by slaves, ruined as it may have been. It told of the fall of Valyria greater than Doom ever could. Aurion would not let it happen.
His declaration was simple.
‘Bend or die.’
Many fought. Futile, as it may have been to Balerion’s black flames. To those who knelt, their fate wasn't any kinder. In the ruined Temple of Shyrkos, Aurion offered them all to Shyrkos and his Eleven Brethren, and the stairs of the citadel ran red with blood. The Valyrians, in varying shades of silver hair, cheered. Volantis belonged to them.
This news spread far and wide. Valyria was not dead. It was reborn in ruined Volantis, and come, Aurion said to all, ‘for I offer you protection against all who would seek to end our civilization.’ Thousands came. Those of Lesser blood. But Valyrians, nonetheless.
But what should this new Valyria look like?
Laegon Lennaris fought for the reformation of the old Freehold. Laena Baesilo spat at the overreach of Laegon, for in Laena’s blood ran the blood of Great Baelerys family and Laegon was someone not worth listening to. Monterys Vacar said, ‘we only have one choice before us.’
‘The more we bicker, the more the world moves forward without us.’ He said. ‘As the world moves forward, every filth and their ilk will tear off their chains and forget who rules the world. The Freehold is unsustainable in these dark days. Forty rulers means gazing in forty different directions. No, I see it clearly. We need to focus on one thing and one thing only. A new Valyia. Who better to lead it than the man who made it? I say Aurion be crowned as the Emperor. Emperor of all Valyrians!’
‘Never had we had an Emperor,’ Laena said. Freehold had been the power-sharing of its Forty Greater Valyrian Families. Even the Primarch was elected among them. Now, however, to hand over the power to one man? ‘Madness!’ Laena said. ‘A single man cannot command the destiny of all Valyrians!’
Monterys Vacar said, ‘the Black Beast grants the destiny of all Valyrians to Aurion!’
But Aurion said, ‘I cannot rule alone.’ If he must rule, then let it be through all who stood by him. ‘Every one of you, who stands here today to elevate me above all, I shall grant you forever a place by my side.’ A new Valyrian Senate. A seat reserved to all who was with Aurion that day. It contrasted greatly with the Valyrian Senate during the Freehold. The old one only had forty seats for the forty Greater Valyrian families. They zealously guarded their privilege. To rule. To command dragons. To touch heaven.
To be closer to gods than men.
The Lessers had only ever gazed at the Greaters in envy.
Aurion said, ‘at this darkest hour, when the world has stopped making sense, let us all unite under one banner. Of Valyria. And a dream to never let it die!’
There were no Greater or Lesser, forthwith. Only Valyrians. Only Equals.
The Lessers found it heady.
The world outside, however, remained indifferent to the Valyrians. Sarnori Kingdom had collapsed in the Long Summer Night into hundreds of petty kingdoms. Dothraki began migrating in all directions. They came from the Bones Mountains, from Jhogwin, and in their own native tongue, ‘the Womb of the World’ the Vaes Dothrak. Hundreds of hordes. Each with their own Khals. Each with tongues different from the other. All due to starvation.
The Great Grass Sea, the fertile lands that had been the crown of Freehold along with the Rhoyne, saw both the invasions and the settlements.
Along the Rhoyne, a new faith took root. They preached liberation in the struggle against eternal darkness. R’hllor, the God of Light, of Life and of Fire. He welcomed everyone in his bosoms. Be they slaves. Be they masters. He saw them all as equals. To those who had no purpose, he offered a mission. To those who had nothing, he offered dignity. To those who suffered under the shadow of the dragons, he offered the light. He only asked to lay bare their soul to fight the greatest war of them all– the War for the Dawn.
But on that day of 142 BC, with the Valyrian Crown falling on Aurion’s head, and when he declared with Blackfyre held high to the sky, ‘Valyria ēdruta!’ to the crowd of cheering Valyrians, it seemed the glory of Valyria was forever to be.